


One More Time With Feeling

by NeoAsh



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Batfamily (DCU), Batfamily Drama (DCU), Batkids are pretty mad at their batdad, Brief detour into Green Latern lore, Bruce Wayne is a Bad Parent, Canon has made him a bad person, Damian Wayne resurrection, Gen, I'm taking his kids away from him, It's for the, Nightwing #30, They disown him after a lot of heavy conversations that have yet to all occur
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:48:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 44,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22876558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeoAsh/pseuds/NeoAsh
Summary: In one version of events Nightwing becomes Agent 37 without a word to anyone but Batman. The world believes him to be dead. In this version of events the world at large still believes him to be dead, but the people that make up Dick Grayson's world know the truth. In between dying and staying dead Dick sends one more message.Or: After all that yelling about how the family deserves to know he's alive, the batfam find out right away that Dick isn't dead. This has some consequences.
Relationships: Bruce Wayne & his protegees, Cassandra Cain & Dick Grayson, Cassandra Cain & Jason Todd, Cassandra Cain & Tim Drake, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd, Dick Grayson & The Titans- eventually, Stephanie Brown & Cassandra Cain, Stephanie Brown & Dick Grayson, Stephanie Brown & Jason Todd, Tim Drake & Dick Grayson, Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Comments: 162
Kudos: 821
Collections: Canon Divergent AUs





	1. Dick- Before I Go

**Author's Note:**

> Out of all the things I wanted to write this is the fic that made it to an actual word document. I just want a timeline where Dick gets to come home from Spyral without everyone mad at him. Is there already a perfect one called Come Home by AlannaofRoses that gives me that? Yes. This is one where they knew from the start though and it's Important to me okay. Was this supposed to turn into a chapter fic? Not at all, but I kept getting ideas to keep going so settle in my dudes. If something along the way strikes you feel free to let me know, whether it's canon I've "reinterpreted" for my own purposes and you'd like clarification, or you just like something. I love it when people like things I do.

Dick gave in. At the end of the day it didn’t matter how much he wanted to stay home, to _rest_ , there was still work to do. Bruce wasn’t wrong, Spyral was a threat not only to the hero community at large, but to the family. Their family...what kind of family are they if Bruce thinks it's okay to ask for this? That's not fair though. It's just some espionage. Some deep cover espionage that requires Dick to play dead for everyone he's ever cared about and then spend months in enemy territory.

He didn’t particularly want to stay dead. It made something in his chest ache in a way he couldn’t pin down, but he’s never had the luxury of shying away from a mission just because it would hurt, and it’s not an option he has now. That much has been made clear to him from the train wreck of a spar that happened in the cave an hour ago. _Very_ clear. However, telling the world he was killed in action was one thing. Faking it for the Justice League was understandable even if it was a little distasteful. Lying to the family though? The boys would never forgive him, let alone Barbara. More importantly, it would _hurt_ them. Alfred didn’t deserve to lose another pseudo-grandson. Tim, Cass and Jason didn’t deserve to lose another sibling. There had already been so much hurt recently. The past two years had been hard, Dick himself still feels wrung-through, and everything in him rages against lying to them. Not about this. Not when it’s unnecessary. 

And it _is_ unnecessary. No matter how much safer Bruce thinks it is, there’s no reason not to tell them Dick is alive. He wouldn’t even have to tell them where Dick is if it really would cause a problem. Dick is going deep undercover, and maybe it’s safer on the Gotham end if only Bruce knows. On Dick’s end though, if something puts Bruce out of commission there's no contingency. Dick might have a marginally lower chance of getting caught, but there’s also a much higher chance he’ll get _stranded_. If Bruce so much as gets sick it would be trouble. Hiding something from one bat is a challenge, but all of them? If Bruce can’t sneak away without arousing too much suspicion Dick will have no contact if something goes sideways. No one will know where he is, but no one will even think to look at all, and the possibility is too real and too uncomfortable for Dick to think about right now.

He can’t say no to Bruce. The man just witnessed his heart stop; he was ready to die to an explosion if only so Dick wouldn’t die alone. The Spyral mission was important, and if Bruce says he is the best candidate for the job, then Dick believes him. He just can’t ignore that Bruce’s hasty plan might be a little too hastily thrown together. Dick can’t ignore that being the one left behind after a death is soul deep kind of damage that he has no interest in inflicting on purpose. So, he needs to leave, but he doesn’t want to lie to his family.

Maybe, maybe he could let it happen if he was a little more tired, just a little more out of it. It was hard to think straight in the cave. Really, after everything that had happened lately, after the torture and Damian's death before that, and Bruce's absence before that Dick is _exhausted_. Leaving honestly sounds great, only focusing on one task might be good for him, and this performance will give him a kind of freedom of movement he hasn’t had in years. It also, possibly, is a bit of a relief to just let B take the reins while Dick gets back on his feet. What Bruce was asking Dick to do was bad if you looked at it from the outside, but he’s trying his best to protect people, and even if he’s wrong he wouldn’t ask Dick to do something like this if he hadn’t honestly convinced himself it had to be done. But. That does not mean Dick is convinced it has to be done entirely Bruce’s way. Like in many instances where he and Bruce disagree on method, Dick decides to ignore B and do what he wants anyway. 

Letting it slip he’s alive will have to be carefully done. He doesn't have a lot of time if he wants to get this done before Bruce gets suspicious, so he considers his options. He decides to only leave a message for Tim and trust he’ll tell anyone who needs to know- and Dick will need to make it clear Bruce can’t find out they know. The message will need to be sent from somewhere he can leave from quickly and discreetly; he can’t get caught on enough cameras to track, which means he can’t be caught on two cameras. He tries to draft an email in his head. It’s entirely too short, and vague, and it feels like something Bruce would write. He tries again and it’s way too sugary, not to mention personal. Tim would believe it was from him, but it might jeopardize his cover if someone else got ahold of it; not to mention Timmy might get hives just reading it. Eventually, he settles on a message that should hopefully do the trick. All he has to do is encode it, find a public library to send it to Tim’s work email, and skip town within ten minutes while avoiding any cameras. Dick almost can’t believe how easy it is.

It feels suspiciously too easy, even. Then he realizes that Tim will think he is dead. That Tim might not check his email for quite a while. So, he needs a way to let Tim know he has a message waiting for him. Dick gets an idea. It’s an awful idea that might not even work but it’s the one that feels the best, and Bruce taught him to trust his gut.

Dick finds a library. He writes out what he wants to say and what he needs to impart if these are his last words as himself. He sends the email to Tim’s email address, leaves the building, and afterword is out of town in less than five minutes. Then, he drives four hours north like he was supposed to when he first left the cave. Before he crosses the border though, there is one last thing that needs to be done before he goes across the sea and becomes someone new. Dick buys a burner phone for twenty dollars cash. He texts Jason’s last known number and writes only, ‘Tell Timmy to check his email’ before throwing the phone away and skipping town. He crosses into Canada to catch his flight out, and while Dick Grayson is alive, he no longer exists.


	2. Tim- Nothing Burns Like the Cold

It’s only been six hours since Bruce informed him that the rescue wasn’t successful, and yet Tim feels like he’s been frozen in place for days. Weeks, maybe, all he knows is that he’s incredibly cold. The manor has never felt cold to him before, not even when he first barged his way in. The cave had been freezing at times for sure, Batman might as well have been stone and ice at first, but how could Wayne Manor feel cold when it had clearly been so well loved. There was warmth in every corner as far as Tim was concerned. The people who roamed the halls were in mourning, the air was heavy with loss, but there was no absence of warmth or love; not to Tim who had his own estate as comparison. 

Logically, Tim knew that it must be the same now. That there couldn’t be some sudden departure of all the things Tim had cataloged throughout the time he’d spent in this house. The house was the same. The house had been through this before, the absence of someone it had previously sheltered. Tim had also been through this before. Tim wasn’t quite sure it had sunk in yet, that…that he…that Dick…Dick wasn’t coming back. He’d left to fight the…Crime Syndicate? Dick had suited up to go fight and he was never going to come back. That’s what Bruce had told him just hours ago. Bruce had told him, but hadn’t Tim been told recently that Bruce himself was never going to walk these halls again? Maybe Tim didn’t need to waste time mourning. Maybe Dick was fine somewhere else, which would be great because that meant Tim didn’t need to think about how Dick had left probably thinking Tim hated him. Tim hadn’t gotten to talk to him yet about the entire mess around Bruce, around _Robin_ , because it was too new. The further away Tim gets from it the more he realizes what an impossible position he put Dick in, but Dick put Tim in a pretty impossible position too, so maybe they were doomed. Maybe they were doomed from the start or maybe not, but Tim thought he would have time to be mad about it. He was supposed to have time to forgive Dick except now Dick was...

A knock on his window. Tim turns to face it but doesn’t move from his spot on the bed. His bed, because Alfred had guided Tim out of the study where Bruce had told them both the awful news. The kind man had looked so much older than Tim had ever seen him as he settled Tim on the bed with a blanket and a pat on the head. Tim feels a chill run down his spine. Alfred had left him alone without a word and Tim hadn’t stopped him. Tim hadn’t stopped Alfred from leaving, just like he didn’t stop someone much larger than the butler from entering. Through the window. The new person seems to be talking but Tim is looking at the window. Is that why he's so cold? Tim tries to blink back into focus and realizes belatedly that it’s Jason whose let himself in.

It makes Tim feel better to have Jason there, which is ridiculous because even six months ago being in the same room as his predecessor would’ve put Tim on the defensive immediately. Jason’s calmed down quite a bit though since he tried to kill Tim, and at least he only did it once, plus he gives excellent Intel. Is that what he’s here for? It couldn’t be though; Jason would never set foot in the manor for something as simple as that. What could he- oh. Dick. That might have something to do with it. Tim tries harder to focus on the older bird.

“Tim. Tiiiiiiiiiiiim. Ti- oh there you are. You finally with me little bird?” Tim nods, then meets Jason’s eyes to really pay attention.

“Alright, great, ‘cause I got some questions that need answered. Like why the hell I got a text from a burner phone in Maine that says to tell you to check your email. And if it’s got anything to with Bruce goin’ around telling people that,” Jason pauses only slightly but it’s enough for Tim to notice. It’s enough for Tim to see how Jason’s eyes unfocused for an instant. “Golden boy is dead.” Tim can’t help it, he flinches. From the split second of devastation that passes over Jason’s face it was an incredibly obvious flinch.

“Bruce said the bomb was connected to his heartbeat. That it was the only way,” Tim says distantly. Jason snaps his fingers in Tim’s face.

“Hey,” Jason snaps, harsher than was warranted in Tim’s opinion. “Pay attention. Check your email.”

“Bring me my laptop, it’s over there,” Tim snaps right back. He points at the dresser that his laptop balances on top of haphazardly. He doesn’t _need_ this right now. Jason places it on Tim’s lap gently, almost an apology, and Tim grudgingly logs in. There are a few internal memos that Tim hasn’t read yet from this week, but it’s immediately clear what he’s supposed to be looking at. It’s the most laughably fake email he’s ever seen, and Tim almost smiles. He goes to run it through a security check as he feels the bed dip. Jason is next to him, and as embarrassing as it is, the solid warmth right in his personal space makes Tim feel better. If the program hadn’t dinged it’s all clear Tim might have even leaned into it.

“Program says it won’t ruin my system if I open it, so here goes.” Tim opens the email and it is absolute nonsense. However, it’s nonsense that Tim recognizes easily as one of the first codes Dick ever taught him to crack. Tim turns to Jason to ask for some scratch paper, but pauses when he sees the older boy's distress.

“Jason? What wrong, it’s a code I know how to crack so it should only take a second.”

“Of course, you should know how to crack it. It’s the one the Bat came up with,” Jason says.

“Bruce came up with it?” Tim asks curiously. Jason quirks his brow.

“You didn’t know?” He sounds surprised.

“No. It’s one of the first ones I was taught how to solve, but no one said it was anything special, just that I should know how to crack it.”

“It used to be the SOS code,” Jason says, he sounds hollowed-out. “Boss himself made it up so that only a Gotham operator could read it.”

“SOS code? Dick never said-”

“Well they obviously switched to something else, replacement.”

Tim pauses for a moment but rallies as well as he can. “Get me something to solve this on.”

They spend the next few minutes in silence as Jason finds a pen and paper, and then as Tim deciphers the message. He reads it over, then reads it over again, then hands it to Jason because he might start crying if he keeps staring at it. Jason let’s out a shaky breath and then another that could be a laugh, but then swears once, violently, and throws one of Tim’s pillows at the wall.

“Are you kidding me! I can’t believe this, even _I_ wouldn’t have ever guessed that the old man was this terrible. What a- I don’t, can’t even- I’m Apoplectic. I’m gonna,” Jason stops as he feels a hand on his arm. Tim is shaking; he’s relieved and upset in nearly equal measure, and Jason is scary when he’s mad, and a not insignificant part of Tim wants to just let Jason tear Bruce apart for this. It’s just that,

“Dick said he can’t know that we know.”

Jason seems to seethe for another moment, then yanks his arm out of Tim’s grasp and sits down hard on the bed next to him. To Tim’s surprise Jason throws an arm around his shoulder and pulls him closer. Tim takes a time-out to process that Jason is holding him. The contact feels safe, grounding, and Tim savors the touch.

“We have to tell Alfred,” Tim whispers. He’s almost positive the butler doesn’t know.

“Okay. Discretion has been left to you Timbuktu, anyone else who should know?”

“The girls. Cass for sure. Probably…probably Barb and Steph too.”

“I’ll take the Clock Tower. Find whoever else yourself.” Jason stands and leaves through the window before Tim can even get another word out. Tim feels like his mind is reeling; it’s been seven hours since Bruce falsely informed him that Dick was dead. He shivers, takes the translated note in hand, and goes to find Alfred. 

_Call my friends and tell them that I love them, but I’m not sorry. Call our friends and tell them that I love them, and I’ll miss them, and I’m sorry. A bird is flying but not past your window, and the one who set him loose can’t know you found out. Have the shadows take care of each other until the eldest can find their way home_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3


	3. Jason- Gathering Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know Babs is supposed to be batgirl again for this, but she's Oracle in my heart and so she's O here. It's fine, the Damian resurrection plot is VERY different in this timeline, so it's fine.

Jason shouldn’t be out on the street tonight. Awful air quality for one. There’s a thunderstorm rolling in that’ll end up a downpour within the hour. It’s a Wednesday, and everyone knows Wednesdays are for suckers, and no one wants to be that kind of shmuck. There are lots of reasons that a reasonable person shouldn’t be out tonight. Jason specifically though really, truly, should not be out at all right now, and it’s mostly because he can’t _breathe._ His lungs seem to have ceased, or maybe his heart is sleeping on the job. All that Jason knows for sure is that his vision is getting blurrier by the second.

He stops running. Sits on the ground against a parapet to catch his breathe. He’s been running since he fled from the manor, since he went to find out who would know Jason’s number and know that he knew someone named Tim. Timmy- shoulda been a dead giveaway. Probably woulda been if he hadn’t been told a handful of hours before that Dick was dead. Dick, the fuck, was lucky that Jason hadn’t skipped town as soon as he heard. That was what he had planned on doing, get a new phone, new cohorts, new scenery. Bruce couldn’t even protect his favorite bird; the rest of them were doomed. If Jason were smart, he would’ve gotten out while everyone was distracted by grief. It was a solid plan that would have worked. If Jason had gone for it. Which he hadn’t. _Damnit_.

Bruce hadn’t even broken the news to him personally, Barbara had contacted him. Which, in all fairness, was probably much safer for everyone involved, but still. Barbara…Jason didn’t like the cadence of her voice. She had been perfectly strong and compassionate and no nonsense when she told Jason, but it had been off. Not quite Oracle, not quite Commissioner’s daughter. She’d been through a dozen different kinds of hell and Jason admired the hell out of her, but this was a pretty bad blow. Against his will he had wondered if he was the first person she broke the news to, or if this was what she sounded like after practice. Maybe she had told Stephanie. Maybe she had told Cass. How many times had she rehearsed the words before telling her dad? This train of thought, wondering how Barbara was doing, unfortunately led to wondering how other bats and birds were doing. 

Jason was honestly glad that the youngest brat wasn’t here for this. Dick was the only person who had ever truly loved him, and it might be better that he didn’t have to try and face that kind of loss. Tim didn’t have the questionable luxury of being dead though, so Jason had to wonder how the replacement was doing. He and the little bird had been working well together these last few months. Shockingly well. Jason wouldn’t say it out loud but he kind of liked the kid, he was dedicated as hell and absolutely ruthless when he was too tired to care, and too much of a disaster for Jason to hold on too tightly to hard feelings. 

He really liked the kid, sue him. Jason also knew, deep in his bones, that no matter how much Dick had fucked up, the kid was going to take this hard. Maybe especially hard, precisely because he’d spent the last year being mad at Dick. Jason told him he was well within his rights to hold it over Goldie for as long as he wanted to, and Jason could tell from watching them that Dick thought the same. Any time Tim and the blue bird were in the same space Dick kept careful distance, painfully careful if the line in his shoulders was anything to go by, made it clear Dick wasn’t holding Tim’s resentment against him. Shoulda been fine, except now Dick was dead. Jason doesn’t think there’s anyone in their “family” that doesn’t know the sting of unfinished business. Family. If they were family like Dick quietly insisted, then that makes Jason the eldest now. That makes him Tim’s only brother, his older brother, and he doesn’t know what to feel about that at all. Does he want to be Tim’s big brother- does he have a choice? Is this what Dick felt like when Jason had gotten adopted? 

Just as he was about to really fall into his thoughts Jason’s phone had lit up with that damned text. Which had led to the discovery that Bruce was even worse than he thought. At first, he was half hoping that Barbara had somehow gotten it wrong but seeing Tim’s full body flinch had confirmed that; one, Dick really had kicked it, and two, Tim was not taking it well. 

Then the message. Dick lived, that’s what it had to mean. There was no other explanation. Dick had made it out alive, and Bruce knew and lied to them all so he could send Dick on a mission. He was ready to blow up the entire Batcave, honestly might have tried if Tim’s shaky hand hadn’t halted him. So, he hugged the kid, both because he was shaking so hard Jason was worried that he’d hurt himself, and because it felt like something Dick would do. Then he ran as soon as an excuse presented itself. Jason was no liar, he ran like a coward, and he kept going until his eyes blurred and his lungs hurt and he couldn’t feel his heartbeat. He’d at least gone in right direction; the clock tower was only ten blocks away. Less than a mile, easy peasy. When he got there, he’d tell red and whoever else that Bruce had betrayed them. The distance felt insurmountable. 

He’d break the news to Barbara like she had done for him, except that his news was somehow much better and much worse, and Jason had virtually no experience with gentle handling. 

His entrance is less than graceful, and in an embarrassing display Cass had to help him all the way inside. That security system is brutal. Cass squints at him, then leads him deeper into the building, hopefully toward Barbara. The two of them end up a room full of monitors. In front of them with her glasses askew sat the woman he was here to see. She looked down but not out, not bad; he could only guess how much of her composure could be contributed to the fact that she had ample warning of his arrival. She didn’t turn to face him but did deign to greet him. 

“Hello, Jay.”

“Hi Red,” he says. He doesn’t know how to do this. His throat goes dry when she turns to him. She gives him such a warm smile he feels like he doesn’t deserve it. 

“You look cold,” she teases. “Can I get you something warm to drink?” 

“Dick’s not dead,” he blurts out. This isn’t what he had in mind, but he can’t let her play mother hen when they’re on such radically different pages.

“Jason,” she frowns. He rushes to explain.

“I’m not in denial, he sent a message. That text I asked you to track was from him, T got an email written in the old SOS code. The one Bruce himself made up that I’m pretty sure only the four of us can write, and Dick isn’t dead. He’s not dead Barbie and we thought you should know.”

Barbara doesn’t say anything right away. She blinks at him then looks down, eyes calculating. She’s so still Jason bites his lip to stop himself from doing something stupid like asking if she’s okay. When she looks back up at him the shock is still on her face, but it’s been smoothed over and it mixes with something vicious. When she grins at him, he’s surprised that smile isn’t sharp, instead still as warm as it had been earlier. 

“Have tea with me. We are going to have a Discussion and there’s no reason to be uncomfortable while we do so.” She turns around and heads into the next room without even looking at him. He’d question the trust, but he hasn’t forgotten that Cass is still somewhere in the shadows, and he’d be on his ass before he took one step in the wrong direction. Neither of them says anything as the tea steeps, nor as they make their way to the living room. Cass reappears to move Barbara from the wheelchair to the couch, then retreats somewhere Jason can’t see. He settles on the other end of the couch. 

“So. Supposedly, Dick sent a message to Tim to let him know he was being lied to, and sent you a text to make sure Tim actually saw the message.”

“Yeah.”

“Out of everyone who could have pointed Tim in the right direction he picked you. And out of everyone who could have spread the word about the ruse he picked Tim. Yes or no?”

“Yes,” he grits out. 

“He doesn’t want Bruce to know we know,” she levels him with a look he can’t quite decipher but makes him want to shiver. 

“Got it in one,” he says flatly. 

“Okay then.” She takes a deep breath. “Dick is alive, Bruce knows, and he can’t know we know. Anything else?” Jason goes to say no, remembers the last sentence, and then goes to say no again when Barbara says, 

“Anything at all.” 

“…He said to take care of each other.” 

Barbara tilts her head up toward the ceiling. Let’s out a long sigh. A smile grows on her face slowly, a small, fond thing. “Yeah,” she admits. “That’s sounds like something he would say.” 

They sit together on the couch with their cooling tea and watch the rain come down. They still have a lot to talk about, like whether they should find out what Dick is doing while pretending to be dead. They talk about Bruce, about what this means for the team in general. They don’t get very far into that topic of conversation, but they try, and it can wait for another day. They talk about who gets to be in the know, and Barbara guilts him into offering to help Tim tell Steph. It really doesn’t take as much needling as it should, Jason likes Stephanie, and he did leave Tim out to dry earlier. There will have to be a meeting with all of them in attendance- every bird and bat left without the big bat himself present, and he makes it clear that while he will grudgingly attend, he refuses to be on the planning committee. Barbie has the audacity to laugh in his face and tells him that he’s the acting senior robin, and that means that she, the senior batgirl, gets to boss him around as much as she darn-well pleases. This statement is horrifying to Jason on many levels, and he quickly changes the subject. 

“Anyway, we both know we’re nosy as hell, so we should definitely find out _what_ the mission is if not where Wingding is. How you wanna play it?” 

“Hmmm, well the cave footage is almost certainly still there. The planning time would’ve been when he was supposed to be mourning, so there’s no reason any of us would look for it. I don’t think that aspect of covering his tracks is very high up on his priority list right now.”

“Simple and clean. Love it.” Jason pushed himself up off the couch, then turned to help Barbara back into her wheelchair. They drop their empty mugs off in the kitchen on their way to the oracle’s domain. The footage is there like Barbie said it would be, but Jason can tell there’s something wrong almost as soon as it’s started. Dick is there alright, definitely alive, and the part of Jason that needed to see to believe was relieved that the older man really was okay. 

Except, that was the hang-up wasn’t it? Dick looked far from okay on screen. Jason watched in growing anger as Bruce started telling Dick it was his own fault for getting captured, that all of it was Dick’s fault and he needed to know that Dick was still capable. He saw green as Bruce informed Dick that they were going to fight, one last time, and Dick’s only rule was that he had to win. It dawned on him in that moment, when Dick started taking the punishment like the whole situation wasn’t ridiculous, that Dick was being thrown straight from one nightmare to another. An unmasking followed by a death scare? That was grounds for at least a week-long nap if nothing else. Instead he got this. Jason felt livid, so much so he almost totally missed the part where Bruce yelled- he was yelling… _I trained you to live and I watched you die!_

No. Jason didn’t know what he meant, how was that- _The bomb was connected to his heartbeat._ That must be it, they had to stop Dick’s heart to stop the bomb, but they got it to start again. It surprisingly didn’t make Jason feel anymore settled. How long had Dick lay motionless against an explosive that would never go off? Had he been aware, or had he gone somewhere else? Jason could feel pressure gathering behind his eyes, so counted to ten before he could start panicking, then refocused his attention on the monitor. 

He wishes dearly that he hadn’t. Jason’s pretty sure he dissociates a little for most of it, probably because it’s just the two of them destroying the cave in a violent, bloody fight that makes Jason sway. Dick tries over and over again to get Bruce to drop it, to let him stay home, or at least tell the family. Bruce insists that hurting his friends and family is completely necessary in order to save them from Spyral. Well, at least they’ve got an idea of what the mission is, so watching this horror show wasn’t for nothing. 

That’s honestly what it is for Jason, a horror show. He’s not even angry anymore, can’t be. He’s scared. He’s scared of Bruce, of how far he’s willing to go to convince his favorite to do what he wants, and though his veins sing with wrongness at the thought, he’s scared for Dick. He’s afraid of the implication that Dick is more surprised by Bruce’s timing than he is of his required spar. Doesn’t like that the violence does not unsettle Dick, only the depth of the deception makes him recoil. Even when Jason was a kid and they couldn’t go five minutes without fighting Jason would never imagine anything like this would be possible. They said horrible, cutting things to each other, maybe threw punches where Jason couldn’t see, but it was nothing like this. 

It was one thing out in the field, that was what came with the night life. They can’t afford to be squeamish, and yet there is something wrong with this picture. With people who love each other hurting each other with such abandon, and he _knows_ that Dick loves Bruce with a steadfastness that would be admirable if it wasn’t so annoying. He also knows for sure that Bruce loves Dick, as much as Bruce is capable of loving anyone. He loves Dick so much Jason wonders if it hurts him to feel an emotion so strongly. Maybe that’s why this hurts so much, because Jason knows they love each other, and doesn’t want the confirmation that love has to look like this. 

Eventually they stop. Dick agrees to go undercover, to lie. He agrees to all of it, but there is an exhaustion to his voice, to his entire demeanor, that makes it hard for Jason to be relieved. He stares at the blank screen. He turns to look at Barbara and immediately looks away. Jason can’t feel his hands. He looks between a distressed Barbara, a blank screen, and the floor, then promptly bolts. It’s the second time within twenty-four hours he’s leaving a shaking person behind by jumping out a window, but he’ll make up for it later. He needs _out_ right now or he’s going to hurt someone. He hears Barbie cry out his name, but he doesn’t stop. He feels eyes on him and suspects Cass is following him, and still doesn’t stop. Can’t. 

Jason is on the roof of Wayne Enterprises before he realizes where he was going. He also takes the time to realize that the rain has stopped. Must have been while they were in the monitor room. Lastly, he sees the shadows shift and a slight figure step from them. Huh, guess Cass really did follow him. As much as he would love to shoot at her to make her leave, he knows she won’t be moved if she doesn’t want to be, and he really doesn’t have it in him to chase her away. So, he settles on the ground and gestures for her to do the same. It’s gonna be a long night. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise Cass actually has things to do next time


	4. Cass- A Sister's Work is Never Done

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo I just saw Birds of Prey and I loved it. Coincidentally, have a Cass chapter

Her little brother is hurting. Cass gives him time “alone” on the roof until she sees him brush over the zipper of his jacket. She steps into view and is happy when he sits and pats the space next him. He is hurting, and she can’t fix it but staying with him feels like a good thing to do. She looks for the ways his body tells her how bad he’s feeling.

Cass does not watch his hands for shakes like she would for Tim. The angle of his body does not give him away like it would for Steph. When Dick feels bad, she can tell right away because the giveaway is in the corners of his eyes. She must be more patient for Jason because he likes to try and hide what Steph calls “soft” feelings. Anger is obvious on him, and so is his happiness, but some things are not. Cass has been watching him over the last year as he shyly gets closer to the rest of them, so she knows that when Jason feels soft things, he fidgets. Not like Dick when he’s moving just because his body likes to move, or like Steph when she taps her toes inside her shoes when she’s lying, because those fidgets are fast. Jason fidgets slow, he runs his fingers over the zipper of his jacket or grips his holsters with his pinky fingers and then leaves them there.

Jason plays with his zipper now. The way he holds his body open does not fool her. Cass sees the way his body is twitching, well concealed flinches that happen when his frown deepens. Maybe he is thinking of new bad things. Maybe he is thinking that about how bad things have been happening while he was staying away. She decides to ask.

“What are you thinking?” She asks softly. He looks at her but looks away fast. When he eventually answers her his eyes are on the city below.

“So much of it was lies. It had to be. I thought…I didn’t know. Maybe I don’t know anything about either of them. I’m trying to remember what Dick looked like before I died. Trying to think of what he looked like the last time I saw him.” Jason turns to look at her. He asks, “Your whole thing is body language. What did you see when you looked at him last?”

Cass considers the question. She can’t remember when exactly she last saw Dick. It’s not that she doesn’t like his company. She likes spending time with Dick, he signs and talks at the same time a lot with her, so she can follow along if he starts going too fast for her to catch the words out of his mouth. Other times though, if they have the chance to spend time alone together, Dick is quiet. He says what he needs to with his movement and she almost never needs to clarify what she’s saying with her own. When _did_ she last see him in person?

After a couple minutes she remembers that it was a gala. Cass doesn’t usually have to go, but it was a fundraiser for the ballet company, so Bruce had asked her to attend. Dick was there too because Bruce and Tim were both busy with a case, and they had needed to solve it fast, so asked Dick to step in and watch Cass. They all said it was to keep her company, but they had never trusted her after she put that board member in a headlock.

Anyway, Dick had been upbeat and smiled for all the people that wanted to talk to him. It wasn’t until they had danced together that Cass thinks she can remember something Jason will want to hear about. Tim has told Cass that she and Dick on a dance floor together look ethereal, but something had been different. He was as graceful as usual, he looked at her with so much affection, and she could tell he was having fun. It was just…off. She doesn’t know the words to use.

She huffs. “Something different. Small. I don’t know,” is all she can say. Jason looks frustrated for a second, but nods. He looks at her almost kindly, and his brow is nervous when he says,

“I’ll be around more often. If… if something goes sideways Tim has my number, get it from him.”

“Sister,” she says as she points to herself. She smiles and pokes Jason in the chest as she says, “little brother.”

“Excuse you,” he squawks. “I’m older than you. I get to be the big brother here.”

“Big sister,” she insists. “ _Little _brother.”__

____

____

He squints at her. She squints right back. She knows she’s won when he smirks at her.

“Alright kid, I’m out of here. See ya ‘round.” Jason stands to leave, and she lets him. Cass watches as he gets smaller and smaller with distance and gets up when she can’t see him anymore. She starts moving in the direction of the Manor.

All she can think about is how desperate both people in the footage looked. She thinks Bruce was desperate to prove that Dick was okay; Dick was told he had to win because if Dick could win then he was okay. Bruce wouldn’t have to worry anymore. Except, that wasn’t the only thing maybe. He looked angry. He looked angrier than Cass usually ever saw him. Bruce had looked very angry at Dick, and desperate for Dick to understand why. She wonders if Dick knew, because she’s lost.

She reaches the gates of the manor and thinks about Dick’s desperation to stay. To tell. She wonders if he was scared, but she doesn’t think so. Bruce was honestly angry, and Dick had tried to be angry too, but to Cass he looked upset. Dick looked sad. She wonders if Bruce saw.

“Mistress Cassandra,” Alfred says. She rarely ever comes in through the front door, so the faint surprise she can see makes her lips quirk up.

“Hi.”

“Is there anything I can do for you?” His tone is pleasant and professional. She wonders if he was lied to. Does he know that she has seen the truth? She stares at him.

“Master Timothy is currently in the library and Master Bruce is in his study; should either of those facts be helpful to you,” he says, not ruffled at all by her gaze.

She nods once and goes toward the study. She opens the big door without knocking and sees that she’s caught Bruce off guard. His eyes lock on her and she sees the moment he knows it’s her, watches those broad shoulders relax. He nods his head in greeting.

Cass stands in front of him, directly across and separated by the desk. She watches him. He turns back to his paperwork when she does nothing more. He moves his pen across the pages in familiar motions, but he looks stilted. He moves as though it’s hard, like his hand is much heavier than he’s used to. His breathing is slow, even, but not deep. His breathing is shallow like it’s too hard to draw a full breath. If she didn’t know he was pretending, she would be worried.

It makes her angry. She doesn’t know what she wanted to see when she came here, but this is what she should have expected. They are all supposed to miss someone they all know will come back. Bruce is pretending to be heartbroken, and if she didn’t know better, she would’ve believed it. Cass doesn’t know what she wanted when she came here, but it wasn’t to watch Bruce lie to her. She turns sharply and leaves in a hurry, pulling the door closed loudly behind her.

She stomps to the kitchen and stops when she spots Tim. Tim looks a bit startled, whether it’s seeing her here unexpectedly or because she was stomping, Cass doesn’t know.

“Hey Cassie,” he whispers.

She marches up to him and hugs him tightly. Tim practically melts in the hold.

“Do you know?”

“Yes. Jason came,” she whispers back.

She lets Tim pull away first. He looks bad. She tries to smile at him. Tim’s eyes smile back at her even though his mouth doesn’t.

“I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever, and I don’t want to think about this mess anymore tonight. Come to the game room and watch me play Vib Ribbon?”

She grins for real at that. Nods enthusiastically and leads the way there. Tim sets up the PlayStation and Cass gets comfy in the middle of the couch. She then places a pillow on the floor for when Tim comes back. His lips quirk in gratitude as he settles down in front of her. Tim starts the game, and they both enjoy watching, in the words of Steph, “that funky little rabbit” bop along to the beat. Cass starts playing with Tim’s hair. He sighs when her nails lightly run along where his hair parts, and when she gets to the nape of his neck, he reminds her strongly of a cat arching for pets.

Tim likes to be touched, but how much depends on how he’s feeling. Right now, he might as well be yelling for how obvious it is to Cass that he would like lots of contact. She unfolds from her criss-cross position on the couch and throws her legs over Tim’s shoulders so that he is trapped between the couch and her knees. He lays his head on her leg and refocuses on the buttons he’s supposed to be pressing. They stay like that for a long time- Tim playing the game and Cass playing with his hair. Occasionally they find things to say, but mostly enjoy the moment of peace. Tim was right, it feels like it’s been forever since they’ve hung out, and Cass has missed him.

__They fall asleep that way. Cass briefly wakes when Alfred finds them later, but he simply smiles at her as he tosses blankets on top them. She smiles back, then she reaches for Tim’s hand. She’s asleep as soon as she closes her eyes again._ _


	5. Alfred- Words Unsaid

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one's a little short, but I don't want the next bits from Alfred's pov. But also I love Alfred and wanted to give him page time.

In all his years of service to the Wayne family, Alfred has only truly been disappointed in his ward a select few times. Most often these incidents seem to revolve around choices Bruce makes that to sir himself seem reasonable, but that have quite devastating consequences to the family that he’s built; consequences that most strongly affect the children Alfred cares for, and choices that nearly always revolve around Richard. This most recent misstep may be the thing that loses Bruce the trust of his young apprentices forever. It is a grievance Alfred cannot fathom will go unconfronted, even if redress must wait until Richard is home safe, and he can only hope the young heroes will sustain each other through this mess. Alfred is so very disappointed in Bruce at present.

The sight of Timothy cautiously approaching him was not entirely unexpected, though why the young master chose to seek him out of all possibilities was unclear. Alfred does not need to wait long, for Timothy pushes a piece of paper into his hands. The paper is crumpled, so Alfred smooths out the page and lifts it for inspection. He has hardly gotten the chance to glance at the words before Timothy speaks. 

“Did you know?” He demands. The young man before him is in quite a state, so Alfred reads the note with haste. Then, must reread it. Timothy sought whether Alfred previously knew whatever information this note conveyed, and there is only one thing important enough to them both that these words could possibly mean. When Alfred looks up, Timothy has softened immensely. Though it is at this point unnecessary, he allays the boy’s concern out loud for good measure.

“I assure you Master Timothy that I was not aware of the true situation.”

The lad begins to quickly blink his eyes, he clasps his hands tightly in front of him, rocks on his heels the smallest fraction. It is a heart-wrenching sight.

“How could he do this to us?” Timothy asks. His usual mild tone nowhere to be heard, and the fury of before replaced by whispered devastation. Indeed, how could Bruce justify this? Alfred merely shakes his head sadly. There’s no answer that could satisfy the question, and Alfred will not insult him by trying. In another life, Alfred would wipe the tears he sees forming in Tim’s eyes, perhaps even hold him close in the face of such hurt. As it stands Timothy leaves quickly.

The chores for the day have already been completed, but where earlier Alfred may have wished to retire as soon as proper etiquette allowed, he now had the urge to do something with his hands. Usually he would find a minor task to do which allowed him to keep an eye on Bruce, yet as of now sharing space with the man seems ill-advised. Alfred decides to bake.

The kitchen is as pristine as befits the space. With all put away for the night Alfred takes extra care to gather the ingredients. The canisters of sugar and flour are set for easy access, the butter pulled out to soften, other ingredients make their way to the counter as needed. The familiar motions of baking remind Alfred of better days when treats were baked in preparation for celebratory occasions. Richard placing first during a maths competition for school, or a noteworthy accomplishment with the Teen Titans. For Jason, an accompaniment to an exceptional grade in English. On one particularly memorable occasion Timothy nearly ate enough cookies to make himself sick after coming in first place for a state photography competition. Stephanie tried her luck at convincing Alfred to bake for her at any conceivable occasion, be it perfecting a new trick, or a tiring day, or Alfred’s favorite; requesting three batches of cookies solely for making Cassandra laugh out loud. She insisted three whole batches were required if she was going to get a single treat before Cassandra ate them all, and who was Alfred to deny her after such a compelling argument.

Damian had not taken to his cookies immediately. Alfred strongly suspects that while the child may have become more agreeable to them for their own sake, it was much more likely that Damian liked Alfred’s cookies for their association with him and with Richard more than anything to do with taste. Damian’s sacrifice was a true loss, Alfred had been excited to see Damian grow into a fine young man. His swift end had been tragic and unexpected, but perhaps almost worse than the loss of such bright potential was watching Richard grieve. Richard never was one to back away from a challenge, and Damian was quite the challenge for anyone, let alone a man so young as Richard who already had so much responsibility on his shoulders. It was lovely to watch them grow as a team. 

The child was at rest though, and only moments ago he had been ready to believe the same of Richard. He cannot pretend to know Bruce’s motivations behind lying so injuriously. He can admit though, if only to himself, that he is glad Richard did not let it stand. The eldest bird sometimes took after his father too much; he would not entirely blame the young man if he had been convinced somehow that the deception must be upheld. Alfred recalls Timothy’s desperation to know if Alfred had participated in the lie, contemplates how much worse the reactions would have been had the lie held until Richard returned from wherever he’s gone, and is incredibly grateful that the original robin had put his siblings before the mission. Later, when Cassandra and Timothy are sprawled together in the game room, he can only smile at the sight. These almost grandchildren of his are taking care of each other in all the ways they know how, and he couldn’t be prouder of them. He sleeps soundly that night.

He awakes in significantly lower spirits as he realizes he cannot channel his displeasure in the usual ways. The look on Bruce’s face when he sipped unexpectedly cold coffee would be momentarily satisfying, but if he isn’t to know of the ruse at all such a petty gesture of disapproval would seem wildly discourteous in a time of mourning. Such an out-of-character action could very well give the game away. The risk is minimal, but he will not endanger the safety of any of the young men and women in his care with such carelessness.

He expects to be alone in the kitchen. He has already checked on Timothy and Cassandra still fast asleep, and Bruce never wakes before ten, so imagine his surprise when he enters his domain to find it already occupied.

“Good morning, Master Jason. What a pleasant surprise to see you here.”


	6. Jason- Lighthouse

“Good morning, Master Jason. What a pleasant surprise to see you here,” Alfred says. Has the nerve to sound like he means it, and even worse Jason believes he does.

“Good morning, Alf.” Jason can be polite, if only to Alfred and with no one else around to see.

“Any requests for breakfast?”

“Ah,” he hesitates. He’s not trying to stay for breakfast, not when Bruce will be there. “Actually-”

“I must insist, Master Jason, that you allow me to fix you something to eat. It would comfort me greatly to know that you have at least one acceptable meal today.”

Fucking guilt trips are going to be the second end of him one day. 

“Might I add that since you’ve stopped by so early, the chances of running into anyone else before they wake would be very low, so long as you let me get to work right away of course.”

“I could go for some bacon, I guess. Whatever else you want,” Jason says reluctantly. This is not what he came for, whatever magic Alfred uses to get people so agreeable should be illegal. Alfred graces him with pleased eyes and turns to get to work.

“Can I help?” 

“No. You may however make a pot of coffee if you so desire,” Alfred responds primly. 

Jason moves to makes the coffee. He moves Tim’s weird blend out of the way to get the regular stuff and starts the pot.

“So, is Tim still here?”

Alfred finishes laying the bacon on the pan to bake, then responds, “He is.”

Okay then. “Where’d he pass out this time?”

“And what do you need with Master Timothy?” Alfred asks with just the hint of an edge. Jason remembers that he’d left Tim with the task of telling the man about Dick. Tim looked bad when Jason had left, and he can’t imagine he looked any better when talking to Alfred last night, so Jason can forgive the butler for being cagier than usual.

“I just came to tell him that a family meeting’s being called,” Jason starts calmly. “You are also invited.”

That sure gets Alfred’s attention. He doesn’t turn to face Jason, but his posture does stiffen dramatically.

Jason continues, “I’m not gonna say anything, and _no one's_ gonna say anything to the bastard of the house,” he pauses. Alfred raises an eyebrow at him. “But, if you are so inclined to know what the hell is going on you can call Barbie for details.”

“That will be five dollars in the swear jar Master Jason,” is all he says as he turns back to his task. Jason pours himself a cup of coffee. 

“Breakfast will be ready in approximately thirty minutes. Master Timothy is sleeping in the game room along with Mistress Cassandra.”

Jason nods and heads out of the kitchen. He’d done some thinking the night before, and he still isn’t super sure what being the eldest now means, but he can at least take some of the pressure off Tim for the time being.

He walks into the game room and smiles. He can’t even help it, Tim is practically upside down with his head on the floor but his feet on the couch, and Cass is sprawled on top of him. They’re _holding hands_ for goodness sake. He _almost_ doesn’t want to wake them. 

He pulls a popper out of his boot and throws it down on the ground. The bright spark and loud snap wake the two instantly; Cass ends up perched on the back of the couch, Tim just ends up rolling all the way onto the floor. Cass has her eyes wide open. Tim just groans. Jason has no qualms about laughing at them, and when they both narrow their eyes at him at the same time he laughs even longer.

“Nnnnnng Jaaaaaay,” Tim groans pathetically. Jason takes a deep breath. Then cracks up again because he sees Cass’s frankly adorable attempt to glare him into submission. He lets out a couple more snickers at their expense, and then valiantly collects himself. 

“Hey Timber,” he greets. Jason lifts Tim off the ground and dumps him on the couch. Cass looks at him from her perch, then slides down the cushion to sit on Tim’s back instead, completely ignoring his muffled ‘oof’.

“Al said that breakfast will be ready in twenty. We’ve got business to discuss before I’m blackmailed into staying for lunch too, so look alive kids.”

Jason watches them make the switch to ‘business-mode’ and kinda regrets ruining the mood. They both sit up on the couch, spines straight and eyes sharp, and Jason moves closer to sit on floor in front of them. He senses Cass’s sudden unease, sees that Tim’s expression is still sleepy despite his efforts, and it makes him sigh. He starts with Tim.

“You told Alfred, right?”

“Yeah.”

“I told Barbara and her,” he nods at Cass. “Do you want to tell Blondie?”

“I…I mean she should know, um,” 

“You mind if we tell her together?” Jason asks nonchalantly.

“Together?” Tim asks quickly. “I mean, yeah if you want to, I don’t mind telling Steph together.” It would’ve been an okay recovery, except little Timmy can’t quite keep the hope out of his voice. Jason will be nice and let it slide- blame it on the kid’s lack of coffee.

“Alright then,” Jason says. He turns to Cass, “You’re up princess, text Steph to meet us at Pauli’s Diner for lunch. If she asks why just tell her it’s important and that she can get anything on the menu, on me.”

Cass eyes him for a second, then nods her assent and pulls out her phone. Jason waits until she looks up again.

“There’s an all-of-us-except- _him_ meeting tomorrow night. Does that work for both of you?”

Cass tilts her head to think for a moment, then nods her head yes. Tim squints at his lap and Jason realizes he might not know what day it is. 

“Tomorrow is Sunday. Does that help?”

“Oh, yeah. I have a thing on Monday, either a board meeting or drug bust I don’t know, but Sunday night works for me.” 

Jason has the strong urge to tell Tim to get his life together, but that would be too hypocritical even for him, so instead he stands and gestures them to follow. They head to the dining room and Jason is glad that he agreed to breakfast because the dining table full of Alfred’s cooking is the best thing he’s seen in weeks, plus it smells incredible. 

He turns to see Tim head directly to the coffee pot. When he turns back to the table Cass has already inhaled half a plate worth of food. Jason decides to pile as much as he can onto his own plate and sit as far away from Cass as possible.

Family breakfast is surprisingly nice. The room is mostly quiet as they eat, but the silence is far from oppressive. Cass shows he and Tim memes from Steph that make Tim giggle. Tim throws things at Cass when she tries to steal food off his plate. Jason keeps his insults mild and his teasing is more good-natured than even he expected. 

It’s just…nice. 

Jason looks at the clock and sees it’s almost eleven. He reminds Tim to be at Pauli’s at 12:30, then bids his companions farewell before undesirable number one can come in and ruin the atmosphere.

Once Stephanie knows the ugly truth, that should be everyone covered. On Sunday they’ll come up with a game plan on how to deal with Bruce, but while Jason would love to go straight for his kneecaps, he doesn’t know how much maneuvering room they have before Dick comes home. Especially after seeing how far Bruce went just to send Dick away. Oh jeez, the cave footage, they’re going to have to show the rest of them. 

What a clusterfuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo why did I write a story where the character I’m most comfortable with (Dick) isn’t even in it for almost the entire first third?? This was going to be a twelve-part series of one-shots about the fab five Titans taking over the world together as best friends fed up with the System™. Instead I’ve committed to a family fic about realizing ‘oops putting the mission above all else may make your dad a bad dad’ and the kids helping each other work through their issues. I mean no regrets but What the Fuck? In other news, Steph is next chapter, and then the chapter after that things finally start happening. In other, other news, I edited the previous chapters so they read better bc I write these in a frenzy at 1am and am editing as I go


	7. Stephanie- Yesterday is Gone

Stephanie was only here for the free food. At least, that’s her story and she’s sticking to it. She didn’t know what the hell Tim and Jason wanted with her, but whatever they had to say had to at least be better than yesterday’s news. Yesterday had sucked, she’d spent the whole evening eating cereal and watching movies. Cinnamon toast crunch, because no matter what Dick says it’s better than cheerios. 

Yesterday, Steph had gotten the news that Dick was done in. It’s not like she was, y’know, close friends with him for years or whatever but…Dick was Batman while she was Batgirl. And yeah, maybe they didn’t have an awesome start. Dick was pretty grumpy about the whole thing for awhile. He did apologize though, and more importantly he actually stopped being a jerk, instead of half-apologizing and changing nothing like _some people_ are inclined to do. He’d tried to explain that it wasn’t entirely about Steph, just bad timing and bad circumstances, and that he would do better to respect her.

Steph could believe that. He might’ve been able to keep it together around Dami most of the time, but the guy was losing it under the cape and cowl for the first few months, and Steph is basically the only one who was around to see. Jason was crazy, Tim was spiraling, Cass bailed. Gotham was a mess and so was every vigilante in it. 

Later, after she and Damian had gotten if not close then at least better acquainted, Dick had told her he really appreciated her willingness to drag Dami into doing kid stuff. When Bruce came back, and things- _people_ \- were being reshuffled, Steph had been grateful that she’d have another year without Bruce in Gotham. Even if his looming shadow kinda put a damper on things.

So maybe Stephanie was just the tiniest bit fond of the nightmare child and his batdad. Damian was the brattiest kid she’d ever met, and Dick tried too hard, but no one ever accused Steph of good taste in company. With Dick dead too… with both of them gone it felt like something important was missing. Maybe it was just her. 

Anyway, that was yesterday. Today would be better. Today was already better, she didn’t have to pay for her own lunch. 

The boys at least had the manners to wait until Stephanie had eaten her food before talking bat business. Tim’s attempt at small talk had been awkward and Jason only seemed to be there to keep Tim from imploding, but whatever. All in all, not the worst lunch she’s ever had. 

When they both lean forward, Steph leans to meet them. Tim tells her very quietly and very seriously, that Dick wasn’t dead. Bruce lied to everyone and now Dick is on a mission, and Steph can’t let Bruce find out that any of them know.

 _That’s wonderful_. That’s great. She says so out loud. Both boys are confused; apparently the typical reactions so far have been betrayal and anger. Like, okay she _gets it_. This definitely goes on the ‘Bruce No’ list, but Steph faked her own death so couldn't really judge, and Dick didn’t even let the ruse go on for a full day. Dick is alive and that is what matters the most to Stephanie. Obviously, he’s not dead, can’t believe she fell for it, Dick can’t die. Steph would miss him. That’s just not allowed.

Sentiment like that makes emotionally stunted people twitchy, so instead she offers, “Good for him. He needed some time away from the city.” 

She’s not bluffing either. Genuinely, D needs a break. He’s good at undercover work, so aside from the whole ‘telling people he’s deceased’ thing, this should practically be a vacation for him. That optimism gets a bit pulled down when she sees Jason. He’s Crime Alley through and through, but so is she, and Steph sees through his bullshit front in a second. He’s holding out on her, and it’s something important. When she asks what it is Jason starts looming and tells her to drop it.

Yeah, no. Jason’s gonna hafta think again because he’s not nearly as scary as he thinks he is. She tries again but Jason firmly stonewalls her. Even Tim looks confused at this point, asks what else there is. Jason just looks at her and tells her that there is a family meeting this Sunday. He says if she wants to know, she can find out then because he’s only going to hash it out once. They finish up quickly after that.

That was certainly…something. Who even knows? Not her, that’s for sure. She’s not sure about any of this, so she takes the only logical next step. Stephanie talks to her mom.

“Wow, Babydoll. That’s some crazy shit,” Mom says.

“Yeah, I know! Jay was acting really weird at the end, acting like someone had kicked his puppy, like what?” Steph flops next to her mom on the raggedy old loveseat, leaning her head on a shoulder much steadier than her own right now. 

“Maybe it was too much to talk about in public? You said you were invited to some secret bat meeting?”

“They called it a family meeting. Old Brucie isn’t going to be there, but from the sound of it everyone else is going.”

“Do you want to go?” Mom asks plainly. Like it’s not a loaded question. Like Steph has an answer. 

“Maybe? I mean, Bruce telling everyone that Dick was dead was definitely a jerk move, but they are all way madder than I am about it.” Her mom opens her mouth, but Steph is on a roll and keeps talking. “And I am always ready to throw down with the bat. He’s such an ass, but I don’t. I. If I go there tomorrow, I’m probably going to feel like an imposter. They’re all so torn up about this but I’m not…I might wear a bat on the costume, but I’ve been distancing myself from Bruce for almost as long as he’s been back.”

“Stephanie. Look at me.” Steph complies. “Steph, baby, that man doesn’t deserve you at all. Let me ask you this though, does he matter more to you than all those other kids?” 

“What do you mean?” She asks slowly.

“You want to distance yourself from Wayne. Seems to me like this get together isn’t really about him, it’s about Dick.”

“Well, yeah, but it’s about how they’re gonna hide what they know about Dick _from Bruce_. All I gotta do is not talk to him and he’ll never know.”

“So you don’t want to go. Problem solved.”

“Mom, it is not problem solved! It can’t be that easy!”

“Why not?” she asks reasonably. “You don’t feel like you belong in that setting, and if you don’t think you should be there why should you go?”

“Because…because!” Steph shouts. “I don’t think I should be there, but… _oh my god they do._ ” 

Mom starts smirking at her. She feigns innocence when she asks gently, “Oh my god they do what, Babydoll?”

“They think I should be there. The only one I talk to on a regular basis is Cass, but Timothy Jackson himself was put in charge of who to tell; this was super important info Mom, if it got out it could land Dick in a lot of hot water. They’re all so worried about this, they’re keeping it as hush-hush as possible, and…” she trails off, overwhelmed. Mom pokes her on the cheek. 

“This is some real classified stuff happening. Aaaand...?”

“Tim decided to tell me. There are days he still can’t look at me, but no one even batted an eye at him telling me all about something they’re taking so seriously. I’ve been invited to a meeting not even Bruce is allowed to go to.” 

“What kind of meeting did those boys call it, again?” Mom asks with mischievous eyes.

“Ummm, oh.” Steph feels her ears start to burn. 

Her mom starts to stand up, then kisses the crown of Steph’s forehead. While she’s there she whispers, “Seems like you’ve got your answer.” 

As Stephanie watches her walk away, she feels a humming under her skin. It feels warm and smooth and _nice_. She’s been invited to a _family meeting_. Got her mom’s seal of approval and everything. She had to show up tomorrow after that.

To celebrate, she texts Cass and harasses her into giving up Jason’s number, then sends him memes. Then keeps sending them. She has received several death threats to stop before it even hits midnight, but she will not be deterred. What’s the point of having an older brother if she can’t send him progressively more will-shattering and brain-melting memes until the break of dawn?


	8. Tim- All Cards on the Table

Tim is in the Batcave ostensibly getting ready for patrol when he hears the Batcomputer ring. Bruce, who was already at the monitor, picks up the call. Tim pretends to listen as a leaguer apologetically asks Batman to come to the Watchtower. Poor Plastic Man probably doesn’t know about Nightwing, Patrick has been off planet for the past few weeks, and it’s only been two days. Even League gossip doesn’t travel that fast. 

Plastic Man explains that there’s something wrong with the gravity regulators and Cyborg is unavailable, so could the Bat please come fix it? Batman gives no answer and hangs up.

“Are you going to ask Oracle to fix it?” Tim asks.

“Mn.”

Okay then. Tim waits until he’s sure Batman and Oracle have made contact, then turns around and smirks to himself. After lunch with Stephanie, Tim had consulted with Jason and Barbara on ways to distract Bruce tonight. It would have been easier to avoid Bruce’s attention if they scheduled this during the day, but it would’ve taken a lot longer to coordinate, and this was an emergency. 

That bug in the Watchtower is courtesy of Tim and it can’t be deactivated remotely. Cyborg, who would usually be called first, is busy in Jump and more importantly isn’t on call tonight. A malfunctioning gravity system isn’t urgent enough to cause panic, but it is the kind of thing that needs fixed quickly enough that Batman can’t leave it until someone else is available. Bonus, there might be some cleanup to stall Batman even longer. 

Tim knows the moment Barb informs Bruce that the bug must be fixed manually because his growl is audible from across the cave. That’s his cue. Tim takes quick strides towards Bruce and stands next to the man, tilts his head curiously, and tries to sound concerned.

“Batman? What is it?”

“Oracle says she can’t reset the Watchtower’s gravity.”

“It’s needs a manual reset then,” Tim says sympathetically.

“I’ll call Victor,” Bruce decides, and Tim almost cringes because he can practically hear his jaw clenching.

“B,” he starts. “Vic isn’t available right now. I think you might have to go.”

Bruce says nothing, just glares at him, so Tim appeals to Batman the best way he knows how.

“Even if you get a hold of Cyborg it’s going to take time, and they’ll probably get someone else to try in the meantime. I mean, not that I don’t believe in the JL’s ability to problem solve, but do we really want people to just start pressing buttons and compromising the systems entirely?”

Batman let’s out an annoyed sigh, but his jaw unclenches, and Tim can see that he knows Tim is right. Time to seal the deal. 

“Bruce,” Tim says gently. “It won’t be all night, right? I know…maybe we’d feel better if you stayed here, but Cass and Steph and even Jason are going to be out tonight. We’ll take care of each other.” Tim lays a hand on Bruce’s arm and smiles up at a considerably softer Batman. “Everyone has back up. We’ve got Barb _and_ Alfred on standby. Go help your team before they break something else; _we_ will be okay.”

Bruce lays a hand on Tim’s shoulder. He looks to the middle distance for a moment, seemingly considering the words, then looks down at him. 

“Be careful.” 

“I will,” he promises. It’s as close to ‘I love you’ as Bruce gets nowadays, and Tim smiles a little more genuinely despite himself.

Batman squares his shoulders and marches to the Batmobile. He says nothing more as he gets in the car, and then it’s just Tim all alone in the cave. He lets out the breath he’s been holding. That’s the critical part of the checklist taken care of. Tim allows himself to feel accomplished because he has a sinking suspicion that getting Bruce out of Gotham will prove to be the easiest part of tonight. 

He strips out of the Red Robin suit. Once he’s back in street clothes he heads up stairs to the kitchen, and signals to Alfred that he’s been successful. 

“Excellent work, Master Timothy. I’ll pull the car around, but do put on a jacket, it’s cold outside.” Alfred is gone before Tim can comment, but while it hurts Tim’s pride, he’ll get over it. He moves to the foyer to wait and looks up the weather on his phone. Thirty-three degrees. Tim concedes to Alfred’s wisdom and puts on a jacket over top of his hoodie, and though it makes him uncomfortably stuffy he endures it- stupid splenectomy. 

Alfred pulls up to the door with a town car, Tim gets in, and they make their way to Old Gotham. They’re using one of Jason’s safe houses for their purposes tonight, and though Jay will probably blow it up as soon as they all leave Tim can appreciate the trust that even this much requires. 

As expected, he and Alfred arrive last since they couldn’t leave until Batman did. He walks in and takes a seat at- at the round table. Really? He wonders how Jason even got that in here, it’s huge but the door isn’t very wide, and that thing doesn’t look foldable. Oh well, it’s a mystery he can solve another day.

He takes a seat on Jason’s left. The girls are all next to each other on Jason’s other side, and Alfred takes a seat next to Barb across the table. There’s a big screen set up on where the table is unoccupied.

Jason turns to him with some kind of look in his eyes, but Tim can’t for the life of him place it. It’s such a familiar expression that Tim’s frustrated the dots aren’t connecting. Where has he seen that look?

Then, Jason asks quietly, “Are you ready, little bird?”

“Let’s get started,” he answers just as quietly. Something like resolve passes through Jason’s eyes, then he turns to the rest of the table and yells for their attention. 

“Alright, before anything else happens we gotta get on the same page. Red over there pulled up the cave footage from right before Dick left, and fair warning, it’s awful. Old bastard did a lot more convincing with his fists than anything else, and if we’re gonna be talkin’ then the rest of you deserve to see how much of a mess we’re really in.”

Those are some strong insinuations. When Jason was dodging questions in the diner, he must’ve been thinking about this, about the cave footage. Honestly, Dick and Bruce fighting, though more on the rare side recently, isn’t new. From what Jason is saying the fight got physical, but they communicate more effectively with actions than words anyway, so while seeing them come to blows will be unpleasant, he can’t imagine it’ll be as atrocious as Jason’s suggesting.

Tim is wrong. He’s so wrong. He’s _so _wrong. Tim doesn’t want to see this.__

__He has to though. He must. Knowing the full situation is never a bad thing. Even when the full situation makes his skin crawl and his blood run cold. Tim can’t look away, the ‘spar’ is like a train wreck, and he takes it all in._ _

__He catalogues every hit and every kick. Tim flinches and braces himself in time with Dick on screen. Tim looks and processes the way he was taught, taught by _those two_ , and every blow becomes burned into his mind. _ _

__The words are ugly too, but in a familiar way. Tim was held to very high standards as Robin, and he has no illusions that Dick isn’t continually held to similar standards, even if it wasn’t immediately obvious. Sometimes in the field your best isn’t good enough, and Dick fell short this time. Batman’s standards for Dick are even higher than his expectations for Tim, so naturally Dick’s punishment is worse than Tim’s ever seen. It makes sense, but it still makes something in Tim want to curl up and cry._ _

__It also hurts to have confirmation that Bruce doesn’t trust him. Doesn’t trust any of them. At least not with Dick’s safety. He’s not worthy to know of his brother’s well-being, at least to Bruce, and Tim would really like a corner to curl up in now._ _

__The screen turns off. The image of Dick, bloody, weary, but resilient as always lingers in Tim’s mind’s eye._ _

__“Timmy.”_ _

__He startles. He might have been focused on the footage, but he finds tuning back into the room more of a struggle. Tim forces himself to face right. Jason notices._ _

__“Hey, you with us kid?” Jason has that _look_ in his eyes again and it’s suddenly all Tim can focus on. _ _

__“Gimme a minute,” he mutters. He stares at Jason and thinks. Of all the expressions he’s seen on Jason’s face he doesn’t remember seeing this one, but that doesn’t make sense…unless…oh._ _

__He’s never seen this expression on Jason’s face before today, but he has seen it before; it’s one of _Dick’s_ ‘big brother’ faces. If Jason were Dick, this is around the time he would hold Tim’s hand. Take his hand and hold it between them until the world starts to make sense again. Jason is himself though, not Dick, so that doesn’t happen. _ _

__Tim deflates, then tells Jason, “I’m back now.”_ _

__Jason nods, then he squeezes Tim’s knee under the table. Tim is sure the surprise registers on his face, but even the brief contact helps ground him, and Tim redoubles his attention on the other people at the table._ _

__Steph looks pale and angry as hell. Cass looks sad but only that, so she must have seen it already. Barbara is tightly leashed fury; she makes a striking comparison to Alfred next to her as he looks absolutely devastated._ _

__“So,” Tim rasps. He clears his throat and tries again. “So.”_ _

__All the heads in the room turn toward him._ _

__“So, here are the facts we’re working with. Dick was strapped to a bomb that was connected to his heartbeat. In order to stop the bomb from exploding they stopped Dick’s heart. Then they restarted it somehow, and Bruce brought Dick home. He gave Dick a test that looked like, _that _, to see if he was fit to take on an undercover mission to infiltrate Spyral. Dick accepted, but wanted to tell all of us that he was alive. Bruce denied him. He let us think Dick was dead to keep cover, and ninety minutes after Dick left the cave, he sent a message encoded using a cipher only a bat would know to my email address. Lastly, his message said that Bruce can’t know that we know Dick’s alive, but he didn’t say why. Any questions?”___ _

____Stephanie sarcastically raises her hand and says, “Yeah, uh, that wasn’t a _test_. That was a beatdown for no reason, what the actual fuck just happened?”_ _ _ _

____“B fucked up this time is what happened,” Jason snaps. “He’s pushed too far even for Dick to take it lying down. Gave an order so fucked up Golden Boy broke it almost as soon as he was out of city limits.”_ _ _ _

____“It would seem,” Alfred starts, “that Master Bruce has lost sight of his goals as a crime fighter. These unscrupulous methods are unacceptable, and I am truly sorry.” Stiff and proper as always, but it is obvious to them all that he is deeply shaken. Barbara is quick to cut in._ _ _ _

____“Bruce is a grown man. It is not your fault that he did this,” she says firmly._ _ _ _

____“Look,” Jason says. “This is a bad scene all around and we can play the blame game later if you really feel the need, but we gotta focus.” He looks at Tim meaningfully. Why is he throwing the conversation to Tim? Why does Tim have to be in the driver’s seat for this?_ _ _ _

____“There are…two main issues. Firstly, do we keep this to ourselves like Dick requested. Second, it’s obvious that Bruce doesn’t trust us, so should we rethink to what extent we trust him.”_ _ _ _

____Silence. Tim looks at Jason for help._ _ _ _

____This seems to catch him off guard. He kind of gets that look again though, and determination fills his expression. When he turns dramatically to face the table head-on his shoulder bumps into Tim’s, almost like pushing Tim behind him, and embarrassing as it is the almost-shielding makes Tim feel better._ _ _ _

____Steph asks another question before Jason has the chance to say anything. “There any particular reason we can’t yell at the big guy other than ‘Dick said so’ or is that it? ‘Cuz folks I’ve slapped Bruce before, and I might need a better reason not to do it again ASAP.”_ _ _ _

____“Not safe,” Cass says._ _ _ _

____“Oh yeah?” Steph asks, not unkindly. “How so?”_ _ _ _

____“Batman…overreacted. He won’t like us knowing. Might overreact again.”_ _ _ _

____The words themselves aren’t solemnly spoken, but Tim feels horror creeping in. The simple statement knocks his breath away because _what if_ Bruce does this again? Were one of them next? Would he hit Jason, despite wanting him back so badly? Would he kick Steph around the next time she doesn’t fall in line? Cass would have Bruce on the ground before he even took two steps wrong, but Tim can’t do that. Would Bruce hit Tim? _ _ _ _

____“Blondie, hate to say it but we might have to leave it alone ‘til blue bird’s outta the line of fire. If the Bat’s finally lost it who knows how this could shake out?”_ _ _ _

____“I’d prefer to give him hell right now,” Barbara says, “but they’re right, Steph. It just isn’t safe, for us or for Dick, not until we know more.”_ _ _ _

____Tim watches Steph concede. She grumbles a little, but Tim trusts her to keep this on the down low._ _ _ _

____“We continue the charade,” Tim says decisively. “Bruce will be grieving, so we have to go through the motions as best we can, too. Dick is alive, but for all intents and purposes he’s dead until he gets back.”_ _ _ _

____“Hey so,” Steph starts before Tim can continue. “What exactly did D’s message say? I haven’t seen it, and this might be the one thing I’d like to read for myself instead of getting the summary.”_ _ _ _

____Oh. That hadn’t even occurred to him. Tim doesn’t have the paper, but he knows the words. When he goes to speak Alfred beats him to the punch instead._ _ _ _

____“I have the note with me, Miss Stephanie.” He pulls a neatly folded piece of paper from his breast pocket and slides it across the table to Steph’s waiting hands._ _ _ _

____Her eyes dart over the page. Then, she asks the last thing Tim expects._ _ _ _

____“Did anyone call his friends?”_ _ _ _

____“Ummmm,” he doesn’t like her expression. “I thought it was more of a metaphor?” Steph looks entirely unimpressed._ _ _ _

____“T, if these are his ‘last words’ they seem literal to me. Call his friends. Tell them he loves them. He loves all of us, and he’ll miss us a lot while he’s out spying it up, and even though it isn’t his fault he’s really sorry about this. He’s fine, and he’ll come back but not for a while, so we should take care of each other.” She levels Tim with an exasperated stare. “I don’t think there’s any elaborate wordplay going on here.”_ _ _ _

____“Well when you say it like that,” Tim mumbles. Jason huffs out a laugh next to him. Traitor._ _ _ _

____“I didn’t call anyone, and obviously Timbo didn’t either,” Jason says. “Did you, Barbie?”_ _ _ _

____“No. I’m not even sure if Bruce has told anyone outside of Gotham that Nightwing is dead yet.”_ _ _ _

____“I’d say not likely,” Tim says. “He’s not on the ‘do not disturb’ list for the Justice League, and if he had told people that’s one of the first things Clark would do.”_ _ _ _

____“So anyway, we should call Dick’s friends,” Steph says._ _ _ _

____“Lots of friends,” Cass reminds._ _ _ _

____“Yeah,” Steph hesitates. “Dick is friends with everyone, isn’t he? Maybe not, then”_ _ _ _

____“If I may, Richard’s dearest friends are those whom with he formed the Titans. If you were to take it upon yourselves to tell anyone Richard sends his love it should be them.”_ _ _ _

____“That’s only four people, right? That seems feasible,” Tim says. “We’ll try to get a hold of them this week.” Tim feels a little warmer seeing Steph visibly relax with the decision. He gets exactly two seconds to enjoy it before Jason brings up a different problem._ _ _ _

____“Alright people, this is all well and good, but we gotta lay down a new rule. No one stays in the cave alone with him, you understand me? The field is one thing, but downtime in the Bat’s space is another. You stay the fuck away from him unless someone else is nearby.”_ _ _ _

____It’s the fiercest he’s seen Jason in all weekend. There’s an intensity to his voice, to his entire demeanor, that has Tim on edge._ _ _ _

____Cass gives a contrite look, but Jason is unmoved. “No, Cass. I see you, and I don’t care that you’re a better fighter than him. It’s not impossible to catch you off guard, and even though I don’t think he’d try to hit you, there are other ways to get hurt. You bring a partner, or you don’t go at all.”_ _ _ _

____Cass seems to judge him, then decide that this isn’t worth fighting over. Once she nods her assent Jason looks over Steph for a moment, then turns his attention back to Tim. He really might need Jason to stop looking at him; there’s only so much direct attention Tim can take before he starts getting dizzy._ _ _ _

____“Two at a time in the cave, got it.”_ _ _ _

____Jason seems to sweep his eyes over everyone one more time, then shifts gears. He puts on a smirk and leans on his elbows over the table. “Great, now that all that’s out there, who’s ready to beat Bruce at his own favorite thing?”_ _ _ _

____What? Tim looks and sees he’s not the only one confused. Jason rolls his eyes._ _ _ _

____“Let’s get petty.”_ _ _ _

____Ah. Yes, that sounds good. If Tim were a better person, he’d feel bad for Bruce- every single one of them is smirking now._ _ _ _


	9. Stephanie- High Tide

Being petty is so fun. It’s just, so rewarding to watch Bruce walk around cluelessly as karma bites him in the ass every day and he can’t seem to figure out why. Of course, they play it cool, let events play out and be half-forgotten before enacting the next ‘random’ inconvenience. 

They’ve been taking turns, so anything she isn’t there to see herself is relayed to her either by Alfred’s incredible storytelling, or Tim and Barbara’s numerous cameras. Steph is _living _.__

____

____

One day Tim replaced all the light bulbs in the manor with bulbs about to go out so that they’d turn on, but would leave Bruce in the dark almost immediately after. The next day Cass and Steph worked together to loosen the seams of all of Bruce’s work pants, and man was it satisfying to see him get angrier and angrier as his pants seemed to just keep splitting. Really put a damper on his powerful businessman image. Alfred got in on the action by adding exactly three pounds to the Batman cape, which was not enough to be noticeable, but was enough to throw off his balance just a touch. All night long. Then, when Bruce eventually asked if there was something different Alfred had ‘no idea what you could be talking about sir, I’ll take a look when I get the time’. 

Alfred was a very busy man these days, so it was only natural that he didn’t get the time to examine the suit for nearly a week. 

Jason will neither confirm nor deny that he hid the chip from a birthday card in the door of the Batmobile so that whenever the driver-side door opened, “Here It Goes Again” played endlessly. Steph met up with the Bat just to see it happen up close, and the look of pure resignation on Bruce’s face was beautiful. Steph made sure to high-five Jay for that one.

Barbara, the beautiful wraith she is, commissioned a tapestry for every floor of every officially Wayne owned building in Gotham. Some were stitched version of inspirational posters. Others were more personal, like an embroidered picture of Bruce with charred sweatpants on in front of a toaster on fire. The artist did an excellent job capturing his ‘longing for death’ expression. 

Now, some of these buildings are like, youth centers, and Barb has class, so instead of just putting up embroidered insults all around Gotham, every new fixture had a row of dots and dashes at the very bottom. Hardly noticeable, practically invisible unless you’re looking for something out of place, and they all said the same thing. Stephanie wonders if it hurt Bruce’s feelings to realize that someone spent the time and money to hang fifty pictures that all said, “U a bitch BTW”. There’s no evidence to prove whether ‘btw’ in this case stands for Bruce Thomas Wayne or not as of yet, and Steph sincerely doubts there ever will be. 

All in all, it’s been a fun couple of weeks. For them, not for Bruce. Steph has to worry though, because she’s pretty sure that her comrades are losing steam. It’s not surprising, no matter how passive aggressive they are, pranks aren’t going to bring Dick back to them. 

Tim has been extra careful on the rooftops; he looks at least three times before he leaps, and she’s pretty sure it’s because it’s finally sunk in that Dick won’t be there to catch him if he falls. Cass has been trying to help Tim feel better, but as close as they are there are some problems they just didn’t know how to solve without someone older to help them. Jason has been around a lot more, and ideally, he would be able to help solve some of those problems, but he has no idea what he’s doing. Jason is so out of his depth that first week he may has well have been drowning, and Steph would’ve found it funny if it wasn’t so sad. 

They are all kind of drowning, and for some reason it surprises Stephanie. Dick doesn’t even live in Gotham, they’re used to operating without him around every day, or even every week. Steph thinks it has a lot to do with the fact that even though D isn’t always around, he’s always available. If they want a hand on a case, then Dick will look it over no problem. If one of them has been off the map for a few days, then Dick is the one who checks on them. She doesn’t think he’s any of their go-to confidant, but he’s definitely the most reliable, and he’s the best one to call if you’re in way over your head. At least, Steph has had to make the ‘please help’ call a few times, and she usually called Dick. 

Two weeks turn into a month, and the game is over after a particularly rough night where Bruce yells at them all. He tells them that he’s tolerated their misplaced grief for long enough and that they should be more mature than this. At least Alfred has a reason to serve him cold coffee the next morning.

The week after that, Steph pulls Jason aside after they finish patrol. Joint patrol with Jason is usually a good time since causing a little chaos is never off the table, but tonight something is bothering him, and she won’t let him off the hook until he tells her what it is.

“What’s up with you tonight?” 

“Nothing,” he says, like a liar. 

“Jason. You’re not accomplishing anything by not talking to anyone. You wanna feel better? Talk to me.”

He does not, in fact, talk to her. He doesn’t look mad though, just uncomfortable, so she’s safe to give him another push. 

“If you don’t talk to me, then I might get worried. If I’m worried about you, I’m gonna talk about it with Tim,” she says. The look on his face is a good sign, so she keeps going. “Tim will worry too, and the we’ll have to get Cass in on it of course-“

“Okay! Okay, I get it. I want it on the record that you’re terrible.”

“Noted,” she smirks. “Now tell me what’s up.”

“It’s nothin’ really. Not worth a conversation, it’s just…Dickhead made one hell of a buffer.”

That was- not what she expected, but whatever. He’s talking, she just needs some context. “A buffer between you and what?”

“Between B and the rest of us. I thought it was bad before, but he’s got no golden boy to order around now, and it’s…bad. Tim damn near started crying the other night, and I’m pretty sure the bastard almost hit me yesterday.”

“The real oldest kid privilege,” she huffs bitterly. Steph regrets the words instantly; the look on Jason’s face is all twisty, and it’s so honest it’s painful. They’ve all had plenty of time to think about it, did Jay never consider that it probably wasn’t a one-off thing? She looks at him and decides that he definitely considered it, then put it in a box where he didn’t have to think about it. 

“I know it’s not a good thought,” she says, “but c’mon. You know as well as I do that that kinda thing doesn’t come out of nowhere. You should probably think through all those bad implications _before _Dick gets back.”__

__“Whatever,” he says, crossing his arms. “What difference does it make if I freak out about it now or later?”_ _

__“Now you’re just trying to be difficult. Dick is going to sweep this all under the rug when he gets home unless you have a damn good reason for him not to, and you’re not gonna come up with a good enough argument by sticking your head in the sand.” It comes out a little harsher than she meant it to, but Steph needs the words to get through his thick skull. If she’s learned anything by hanging around this long it’s that batboys are idiots._ _

__The words register. Then, Jason storms off in a fit of embarrassment. She assumes he’s supposed to look angry, but his ears are red and she’s no fool. Steph takes a deep breath in, lets it out slow, and tells herself that everything will look better tomorrow._ _

__The next day, Jason goes on a mission with Bruce, and Stephanie thinks things might finally be looking up. For as terrible as things have shaken out, it’s obvious Jason still wants to fix things with Bruce, and a show of trust like this will help. Steph is happy for him. Until Jason comes back, traumatized and unstable. Until he tells all of them that Bruce took him to Ethiopia to relive his own death._ _

__Bruce wants to play Frankenstein with the baby bat._ _

__Huh. Didn’t see that coming._ _

__Stephanie would tell herself that this won’t be what finally sinks them, but she’s no fool, and this is hardly the time to start lying._ _


	10. Jason- Not So Contingent Encounters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this took...longer than I wanted it to, but the next one is already half done so it shouldn't take as long. Anyway hope you enjoy.

Jason officially fucking hates this fucking family. The past month has been a nightmare and he'd like to wake the fuck up now. What is he doing- why did he think that anything would be any different than before? It's obvious that he's only as accepted as he is useful, and the only use Bruce has for him is as a case study. His only current value is his death.

His whole world is green. Jason doesn’t know where he is, can't see past the swirling, sickly green that won't fade. 

It's in his head and he can't _think_

can't think can't move it's not _safe_ he's in danger _danger_ **danger**

He can't breathe. He can't breathe oh god no please he doesn't want to be back here. He can't breathe there's no air left in the 

_coffin._

He’s…falling? Into the p- no. Onto a hard surface…a hardwood floor. He’s pretty sure there were no hardwood floors in the Al Ghul palace. So, not there at least, but he still can’t see. He’s starting to get sensation back in his limbs though, and he can smell cheap floor polish which tells him he isn’t anywhere too important.

“Jason,” a soft voice calls. Talia?

“Little Brother,” the voice says. Not Talia then. Cass.

“Nnnnng,” he groans. It’s the best he can do at the moment. Whatever, he’s at least semi-coherent, and that’s better than he was doing a few minutes ago. He’s still seeing nothing but green. Cass is here though, so it’s probably okay. She can kick his ass twenty ways to Sunday- she’ll keep him safe.

Cass hovers around him, asks quietly to touch him, then helps him sit up when he nods his agreement. Once Jason is mostly upright Cass sits next to him on the floor. The two of them stay like that for as long as it takes Jason to feel more human than zombie; this isn’t the first time Cass has offered to stay with him like this, and it won’t be the last time that Jason takes her up on it. 

Jason doesn’t talk about those few moths after the pit where everything was hazy and incomprehensible. Cass gets it though, she’s taken a dip herself and understands that sometimes the world goes green, that he can’t help it. That there’s nothing to be done but wait it out and hope you don’t hurt anyone.

When he can finally see the world in color and the angry whispers subside enough that he can hear his own thoughts, Jason holds his hands in front of him and signs “All Clear” at Cass. Once they’re off the floor Cass sets a hand on his shoulder.

“Family meeting,” she says.

“Yeah. How long did we manage, two months?” he asks scornfully.

Cass shakes her head and holds her thumb and forefinger close together. 

“Not even two,” he scoffs. “We’re going to have to set some boundaries on patrol.” Damn it.

Jason tries to turn away, but Cass squeezes his shoulder and turns him toward her. He’s about to ask what else there could possibly be- he gets cut off by arms around his middle. 

Cass hugs him like she can hold him together if she squeezes hard enough. His sister is barely half his weight, yet Jason feels squished. It’s new, but not wholly unpleasant if he’s honest, and he can’t find the energy to begrudge her this. There is so little that either of them can really do about the mess they’re in, so instead of pushing her away Jason wiggles his arms out from Cass’s grasp and returns the gesture. 

Jason holds her gently even though he knows she won’t break. Cass holds him tightly even though he just might.

They don’t talk about it. 

No one even bothers with an elaborate ruse for the next meeting, they just ask Kate to pick a slow night and keep Batman occupied for an hour or two. The only other notable difference is that Alfred is not in attendance. It was a Sunday when Batman took Jason to Ethiopia, and now, on Wednesday- _fucking Wednesday_ \- Jason gets to explain to the rest of them that Bruce did another horrible thing.

He gets to watch their faces fall. He is not as surprised at their concern as he would’ve been last month; they’ve been spending more time together and not hating it, and if anything like this happened to them he’d be concerned too…which is a thought for another time. He is however, surprised at how upset they are. Stephanie is a lot angrier about this than she was about the whole ‘Dick situation’ and Barbara looks both livid and on the verge of a breakdown. Tim is very quiet and very still while Cass is very fidgety next to him- not how they should be, Tim only withdraws when he’s incredibly overwhelmed and Cass doesn’t waste a movement.

All in all, not great. 

“So,” Jason says after the silence has gotten beyond uncomfortable. “Maybe don’t accept any partner-up requests from the Bat in the near future.” He doesn’t know. He hates being the one on the spot, but he can’t throw Timmy under the bus this time, not when this is his problem more than theirs.

“Maybe don’t listen to anything he says ever,” Steph grumbles.

“Jay?”

“Yeah, Timster?”

Tim just kind of looks at him for a few seconds, hesitant. It probably took some effort to say anything right now, but he got Jason’s attention for a reason and he’s not in a patient mood. 

“Spit it out T.” The younger boy startles.

“Uh, well, you said that he took you there because he wants to resurrect Damian without a Lazarus Pit, right? What if we just find a different way to bring him back and then Bruce can leave you alone about it?” His words are quiet and rushed, but more determined than unsure.

Jason stares. “You…want to find a way to cheat death, but just so that Bruce has no reason to bother me about mine?” he asks incredulously. “Did I hear that correctly, baby bird?”

“Yes,” Tim says, completely seriously. Like it’s the obvious solution. Kid shrinks a little when he realizes everyone is staring at him now, but he stands his ground.

“Lots of people come back from the dead these days. If we investigated every case- heck, we’d probably only need to look at leaguers who’ve come back and find a method we can use. No awful, traumatizing field trips required.” 

Well damn. It does sound reasonable when he puts it like that. Which is ridiculous but Jason can’t remember the last time his life wasn’t absurd.

“Fuck it,” Jason says. “Look into it. Start with the inner-circle and work your way down. Maybe we’ll solve the case before Mr. Detective himself.” 

He takes a look around and sees that Tim’s got a wild gleam in his eye. Steph catches the look and grins like a madwoman, that’s probably a bad sign. Cass kind of looks like she’s got whiplash. Jason can relate. Barbie isn’t much better; looks like she’s still out of it from the first order of business, which really, box it up like the rest of them already. 

The meeting adjourns and they go their separate ways. Tim start compiling options, and after Barbara gets herself together, they start exhausting those options until they eventually rule them unusable. One by one the list gets shorter. As Jason asked, Tim starts with the founding members.

Any speedster who's ever been around the block is almost immediately ruled out- those dorks barely understand the speed force, no way are any birds or bats going to be able to use it.

Batman and Bat-associates are also ruled out right away because as previously talked about, Jason doesn’t want to break his brain and they’re 100% certain Damian didn’t get lost in the timestream.

Superman still has the kryptonian tech that helped bring him back, as it turns out. Too bad humans can’t recharge with sunlight.

After some digging it turned out that Martian Manhunter was only mostly dead the couple of times he was deemed killed-in-action. Something about regeneration powers. No use.

Diana is straight up too much of a badass to have died in combat before. Jason is not surprised in the least; Wonder Woman is the best superhero. 

That left Hal Jordan. Whose file was utterly useless because it was so convoluted it had to be made up. Jason asked Tim to keep trying to make sense of it, but in the meantime, start moving down the list of other members. Jason hadn’t really expected any founding members to pan out, but it was disappointing, nonetheless.

Tim kept working on it. Jason worked on making sure Tim consumed less than ten cups of coffee per day. They were getting close; Tim only drank eleven yesterday, which is much better than the twenty-one that he had the first day Jason came over to watch him.

Some part of Jason is glad he stepped in. Tim looks a bit like death warmed over all the time, and it makes for a pathetic picture. Tiny Tim wrapped in a blanket in his apartment, post-it notes everywhere including an honest-to-god conspiracy board, and constantly surrounded by coffee cups. Jason takes it upon himself to wrestle him into submission so he goes to bed occasionally. The constant stress on his face makes Jason stressed just looking at him, and that’s not good for anyone, so really Jason is doing everyone a favor by taking care of Tim and they should be paying him for his services. Jason hears a loud thump come from Tim's room and he goes to check. Tim has rolled out of his bed and is crumpled on the floor, but still asleep.

It’s been a long week.

Today in his quest to make sure Tim doesn’t sneak in extra coffee on patrol, Jason tags along with the kid on Red Robin’s patrol route. This, unfortunately, leads to Jason being there while Batman requests RR’s assistance with a weapon bust. Tim agrees on the com but looks at Jason with an expression that screams hesitation. 

“C’mon, little red, what’re we standing around here for?” He starts running and so does Tim, and the relief on his face is worth the unease starting to rise in Jason’s gut.

They make it to the spot where Batman is surveying the weapons dealers. When he looks at them, he doesn’t seem to mind that there are two birds instead of one, instead he gets right to business. 

“Hood take the far side of the building. Cover the exits while Red Robin and I deal with the thugs inside.” he orders.

Jason is about to move when Tim says, “Wait.”

“What is it?” Bruce asks. He’s almost certainly raising a brow under the cowl.

“You haven’t given either of us any information. How many people are down there? What are they armed with? Is there any plan other than ‘knock them down’ or what? Why don’t you-“ Tim is cut off by Batman raising a hand. Instead of the almost-concern of a second ago, Batman is visibly displeased. He’s just staring at the little bird and Jason can feel the tension rising like it’s a physical thing. 

“Red Robin. We’re wasting time.” Jason can’t clearly make out the batglare from this angle, but he can tell it’s a harsh one. He finds himself impressed when Tim doesn’t even flinch.

“Is it a waste of time to brief me on what I’m walking into?”

“It’s a familiar situation. You should-“

“I should what?” Tim asks viciously. “Trust you? What would you do if I told you to just follow me into a sting that I refused to tell you anything about?” 

“This is nothing that hasn’t happened before,” Batman grits out. Then, he does something unexpected. He takes a deep breath and seems to force his jaw to unclench. “Red Robin, what’s really bothering you.” He doesn’t quite manage to make it a question, he’s still too frustrated for that, but it’s considerably more composed than Jason would’ve thought him capable of in the face of such flagrant disobedience. 

“I just want to know exactly what I’m walking into,” Tim says quietly. He’s still got a hard edge, but it’s obvious his righteous anger is flagging. 

“Where is this coming from?” Batman asks. His voice is kind, but…something is off. Something about the way he’s standing maybe. Jason’s hearing warning bells. Tim obviously has no such feeling, as he tells Batman very matter-of-factly, “I know what you asked Hood to do. I would like to make sure I’m not being cornered.”

Dead silence. 

Timmy seems to realize what he’s just said and immediately tries to backpedal. It’s too late though, Batman has already stopped paying attention to him, he’s already set his sights on Jason.

“Hood. You said something to make him doubt me.”

“Look,” Jason says as he puts his hands up. “I didn’t say anything that wasn’t true.”

Jason’s got a front row seat to the batglare now, and it’s in full force. The bat stalks toward him like a predator, and Jason feels his own hackles rise, ready for a fight. He gets close enough to Jason to loom, which is stupid because they’re the same height now and Batman can’t loom over him and expect him to cower. 

“Red Robin,” he addresses without looking. “Go back to the Batcave. You’re done for the night.”

Tim shoots him a questioning look; asking if Jason wants him to wait up or stay or listen to Batman. It has been two months since Jason has taken the role of eldest, and even longer since he and Tim have come to an understanding, so it shouldn’t still throw him for a loop that Tim looks to him for direction sometimes. It shouldn’t, and it’s starting to piss him off that he can’t seem to get a grip. He realizes he still hasn’t signaled Tim one way or the other. 

As much as Jason doesn’t want to send him to the cave alone, Batman won’t be there if he’s here chewing out Jason, and Alfred will probably be there to help. He lets his eyes meet Tim’s. Tilts his head ever so slightly away. Tim nods and swings away. Batman is still too close to him, so Jason pushes him roughly. The bastard doesn’t even have the decency to stumble.

“Haven’t you ever heard of personal space Bats?” 

“No matter what you told him I only did it to bring my son back. That’s not a bad thing.” He says coldly.

“Haven’t you learned anything? Can’t just mess around with resurrection.” Jason throws him one more glance over his shoulder as he leaves. He says meanly, “Might come back wrong.”

Jason runs as fast as he can, and Batman doesn’t call after him. He doesn’t anticipate any other unfortunate encounters tonight. Batman will yell during debrief if they’re still there, but if Jason makes sure Tim is out of the cave before patrol ends, they’ll be in the clear- for the time being, at least. Jason makes it to the cave expecting Tim to be waiting for him or getting ready to leave himself. What he does not expect is for two of Dick’s Titan friends to be cornering him. 

“Yo! What is goin’ on here?” All eyes turn to Jason.

“Jason,” Donna says. “We’re pretty sure that you lied to us when you told us Dick was dead. Mind clearing that up for us?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Jason finally got a hug. Tim is done with Bruce at the moment. The next chapter some things come together (probably).


	11. Wally- Only Real When Shared

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally, more happened this chapter, but then it got a bit long, so they don't figure out the resurrection thing until next chapter. Garth has an apartment in Midtown because I say so- he's a part-time diplomat, so he keeps a place near the U.N. for business purposes. I also want you to know that the working title for this was 'deductions with Donna'

Dick’s been compromised. _Is this real life?_

The twisted versions of familiar faces have told the world Nightwing’s name. It’s so blatant, so sudden and unexpected that Wally instinctively speeds up to give him time to process what’s just happened. This consequently allows him to see the flash of devastation in Dick’s eyes right before the camera feed cuts out. 

He didn’t even know that Dick had been captured, that there was anything wrong because no one had told him. It would make sense; his usual source for info on the bat clan is the one in trouble, and Batman has more important things to do, like find Dick because he’s _alone and compromised_. 

No one hears anything for days. Wally asks Clark, Superman should know what’s up, but he just says the Bat’s been radio silent. Wally asks Bart, if something big went down Tim would want to talk about it, but he hasn’t heard anything either. Wally asks anyone he can think to ask at least twice a day and he knows better, really, but he gets extra anxious when Batman doesn’t report and extra-extra anxious when Dick is in trouble and he can’t help. 

He gets a call to his personal cellphone three days in. 

“Hello, this is Wally, right? It’s Tim.” For a split-second Wally is elated, but then he registers the tone. It’s almost friendly, which is a bad sign, Robin number three is very down to business; if he had good news, he would’ve started in a tone that Dick refers to as ‘adorably clinical’. An attempt at pleasantry means he’s trying to soften the blow, and very suddenly Wally wishes to hang up and stay in denial.

“Yeah, Hey Tim. How bad is he?” Bats appreciate getting straight to the point and Wally’s too impatient to beat around the bush right now.

“Dick…” He hesitates. Uh-oh. “Dick didn’t make it.”

“I’m sorry what?”

“Wally, Dick is gone. The last correspondence he sent said to tell his friends that he loves them, so you and the other founding Titans are getting the call before the official Justice League announcement. I’m sorry. He loves you.”

“Okay,” he says. Deep breath. “Sorry Tim, I gotta go.” He hangs up before the other can say anything more. It was rude, it was so incredibly rude and Wally will feel bad about it later, but he can feel bad about it after he regains the ability to breathe.

It occurs to him that for all the loss he’s been through, and all the loss his friends have been through, Dick had felt untouchable, in a morbid kind of way. Always a bridesmaid never a bride, except in his case he was always left behind yet never gone himself. It was like a rule, there are theories that the universe itself can’t exist without a version of Dick Grayson flying around somewhere. 

What would the world become in the absence of someone so central to hero community? Nightwing knew everyone, and if he didn’t know someone, he knew someone who did. Wally’s pretty sure Barbara had made a game out of it once, coming up with a list of every possible hero contact and figuring out how many degrees of separation they were from Dick. Not a single person was further than four away. 

What would Wally do, now that he was gone? It’s not like they were attached at the hip like they were when they were kids, but it would still be weird. Weird didn’t begin to cover it; this was his bro he was talking about. Their annual road-trip is coming up in a couple of months, and it was Wally’s year to plan it, and they had just talked two weeks ago. 

At some point Wally had half collapsed onto the couch. Nothing quite felt real, a dreamlike quality to the room that hadn’t been there when he’d been pacing a hole through his floor. The room was spinning, colors blending then clicking into place before blurring again. At least denial was pretty.

Weeks later, during a quiet moment of downtime his phone buzzes and Wally seriously contemplates not answering. It’s probably Iris again, and as much as he loves her, he’s done being coddled by her and Barry. Reluctantly, he glances at his phone to see who texted him. The name ‘Donna’ flashes across the screen and Wally scrambles to read it.

_Garth’s apartment. He and I are already here, Roy inbound. Come NOW._

As nice as Donna was, she was always very direct over text. Wally stood, and began packing an overnight backpack, just in case. He didn't know what she wanted, but now was not the time to get on Donna’s nerves, so Wally got himself together and ran fast to NYC. Two minutes later he was knocking on the door of Garth’s Midtown residence. The door is almost immediately answered, and he is dragged inside by a distinctly thoughtful looking Donna.

As curt as she’d been to get him here, Don still gives him a hug- and a basket of popcorn chicken! What a great friend. A look to his right and Garth is sitting on a barstool, a little slumped, but he still smiles at Wally when he sees the speedster. Wally manages a small smile back with a two-finger salute, then leans against the bar. 

Garth looks tired. That’s really the best way Wally can put it; Tempest is a total powerhouse, and Garth of Shayaris is a skilled diplomat with strong character without any water magic at all, but right now he’s just a young man, slumped over the bar in a rarely used apartment, looking very, very tired. It pulls at something in his chest to see Garth so down, but Wally is feeling the weight of this too, and he doesn’t quite know how to lighten the load for his friend. 

Donna, on the other hand, seems on high alert. There’s a glint in her eyes that Wally doesn’t see very often. It’s honestly the kind of look more at home on Dick’s face than Donna’s, but then again all of them have ‘thinking faces’ that look a bit like Dick’s. It was just such a common expression on Robin’s face when they were kids; there’s the issue though, it was a near constant because Rob was usually thinking of ways to mess with people, and that makes it hard for Wally to tell if Donna is thinking hard or if she’s scheming. 

They all three startle when there’s a knock on the door. 

“How close was Roy?” Wally asks.

“I texted him before you, but I didn’t think he’d get here so fast. It’s only been fifteen minutes.”

Garth just shrugs. 

Donna braces herself and opens the door. It’s Roy alright, and he brought Starfire. 

“So that’s how you got here so fast,” Donna grins at Roy. “You hitched a ride.”

Roy puts his hands up in surrender. “I know it’s important, and I’m not above asking for a favor.” 

Donna starts to usher him inside but pauses when Kori start to follow. Roy senses the tension and frowns at Donna. 

“She’s allowed, isn’t she?” 

“Yes. Later, after we’ve discussed the serious business.” She answers apologetically.

“Donna-“

She takes a step closer to Roy and grabs his shoulder. She’s holding onto Roy, but she looks at Starfire when she says, “I have nothing against you, and usually I’d ask you to stay, but I want as few people here as possible if I’m wrong.”

Roy is about to say something, but Starfire beats him to it. “I do not know what you think you might be wrong about, but it’s clearly dear to you. I do not wish to intrude on a delicate matter.” She turns to Roy and grins. “I am a call away my friend,” her grin gains a protective edge. “For any reason.”

Roy huffs, which makes both Kori and Donna laugh. Kori shuts the door behind her, and Roy stares at Donna, then his eyes flicker to Wally and Garth. Donna leads him to the bar and pushes him into the seat next to Garth, then rounds the counter to stand across from him. 

“Look,” Roy starts, but Donna holds up a hand to stop him. 

“Roy,” she says. “Did you get a heads-up call from a Gothamite a few weeks ago?”

His expression crumples. The other redhead puts his head in his hands and takes a breath. When he looks back up, he looks significantly worse than he did when he came in. It’s not a good look for him. 

“You mean the death call? Yeah, I got it.”

“What were you told?” 

“What?” Roy looks caught off guard, which is reasonable, since Donna very suddenly sounds like this is an interrogation. This continues to be the case when she adds, “that goes for all of you. Tell me exactly what you were told.”

“Hey, Donna, what are you getting at here?” Wally asks.

“Something doesn’t feel right,” she admits quietly. “Something about the wording, and I can’t think of what it is. I need to compare, or this is going to bother me for the rest of time. Please, humor me?” she implores. They all glance at each before nodding their assent, who are they to say no to Donna?

As they all take turns sharing how their individual calls went, Wally starts seeing where Donna is coming from. This whole thing has a suspicious vibe and he’s getting a bad feeling about this. The common theme seems to be vague details about the nature of Dick’s death, though only Donna and Roy thought to ask for details in the first place, and that Dick loves them. Donna is right though; the wording was off and exactly the same for all of them, “the last correspondence he sent said to tell his friends that he loves them” and that made no sense now that Wally’s actually thinking about it. When would he have sent that kind of note? It wouldn’t be from before he got captured; that’s quitter talk, and there’s no way Dick could have known how sideways the whole operation would go. It couldn’t be while he was in enemy hands, if he’d been able to get out a message it would’ve been a location and a request for help, plus- it’d still be quitter talk, and one thing Dick has refused to give up even after all these years is hope. The only possible thing a ‘last correspondence’ could be referring to is his last words, said to Batman before the end, but then why not just say that?

Once is nothing, but four times is a puzzling pattern. The four of them talk it over, and an hour later they’re all contemplating what it could all mean. Something prompted the bats to call the four of them before anyone else, and whatever it was also warranted a line tossed in to make sure they knew Dick loved them.

“That’s just the thing though, Dick already knows that we know he loves us. Took it out of his practice will and everything because we told him it was unnecessary,” Garth says. Donna lights up, whole body straitening. 

“Garth! That’s it,” she shouts. “His will. That’s what’s been bugging me. He has a section for each of us in his will, he showed me though he wouldn’t let me read them. Tim told all four of us the exact same thing, and those aren’t Dick’s actual last words.”

“Maybe they just hadn’t read the will yet, or they didn’t want to read a section not meant for them,” Roy argues.

Garth turns with the most deadpan expression Wally has ever seen. “That doesn’t explain why Tim felt the need to say it. Besides, do the bats seem like the kind of people who respect that kind of boundary?”

“No,” he conceded. 

“Maybe, Donna is onto something,” Wally cuts in. “Maybe she’s exactly right and Richard, the dick that he is, sent them a message _after_ he was supposedly dead, and told them to tell his friends that he loves them. Maybe just because he was in a bad spot and wanted to say it, or he was hoping we would call his bluff.” He’s making a big effort to not slip into superspeed in his excitement, but his words get faster the more excited he gets at the prospect of Dick not being dead.

Donna looks equally excited. Garth and Roy are more skeptical, but they can admit that it’s the kind of thing that becomes plausible in their line of work. 

“You think Dick faked his death, then? Just so we’re clear, that is what you’re saying.” 

“Yes, _Roy_ , that is what I’m saying. Keep up.” 

“Well,” Garth says. “It is the kind of thing that could happen. If Dick was told to fake his death for something, and he thought he could get away with an ‘I’m okay’ message to his family, it stands to reason he would slip in something for us. It really might just be an ‘I love you’ because he’s a sap like that, but if we just so happen to get suspicious-“

“If we just so happen to call bullshit on the whole thing,” Roy interjects.

Garth rolls his eyes. “Then even better.”

Wally feels like his face might split from the smile he’s wearing. His friends are similarly smiling, and it’s the lightest Wally has felt in months. 

“You know we have to confirm our theory, right?” Donna asks excitedly. 

“I hate field trips to Gotham,” Garth says instantly. “Count me out.”

Roy turns to Wally. “Man, I need you to go with her. If we’re right, and Jason is there, it’ll get ugly.”

Wally pulls out his most put-upon sigh, and then drops the act. Smirking, he addresses Donna, “What’re we waiting for, Babe? Let’s go shake down some bats.”

The two of them take their time getting to Gotham. They didn’t have a detailed plan or anything, the entire plan only consisted of entering the Batcave while all the bats were away for patrol, then interrogate whoever came back first. Wally and Donna were both almost positive that Alfred would let them in. If not, well, they’d cross that bridge if they got there. Hopefully, someone other than the big bat himself got home first. Or maybe not so hopefully; Wally’s been itching to get a good hit in on Dick’s behalf since they were teenagers. 

Rolling up to Wayne Manor at 11 o’clock at night should not be so seamless, but Alfred did in fact let them in, and that was that. Then, a bird came back just an hour later. This whole night was already going so well. The two of them had yet to ask Red Robin a single question when Red Hood interrupted, but when Donna told them their purposes his only response was silent surprise. Today has just gotten better and better.

Tim finally asks, “What gave you that impression?”

“That is for us to know. It’s true though, isn’t it?” Wally says.

“Who do you think you are? Just coming in here and acting like you know everything?” Ah. Seems Jason has remembered how words work. Too bad Donna is on a mission.

“Jason,” she says. She waits until she’s got his eyes on hers. “We don’t know everything. What we do know is that our best friend in the universe is probably alive. We know that the only people who would know for sure are you and the other bats. We are not asking for anything else. Just confirmation.”

Jason holds eye contact for all of three seconds before looking away and clamming up. Wally decides to ask Tim instead while Donna keeps staring Jason into submission. 

“Tim,” he murmurs lowly. “You don’t have to say anything that’s going to put him in danger, that’s not what we want. But Timothy,” he says firmly, “he was my brother before he was yours.” Tim’s eyes flash, but the emotion is gone before he can pin it down. He keeps going. “I’m going to ask you the same question I did the first time, how is he?” Tell him that his robin is alive.

“He…” Tim tries to catch Jason’s eye, but Jason is not facing anyone, probably in an effort to block out Donna’s gaze. Wally has been on the other side of that gaze before and he doesn’t blame Jay one bit, it’s piercing. Tim looks back at Wally and Wally doesn’t blink. He won’t cave first, not for this. Tim sighs.

“He made it,” he admits. “He’s somewhere undercover, but he’s alive, he made it.”

Donna’s stance untenses in the corner of his eye. He feels like he can breathe again after holding his breath for too long. Dick Grayson is alive, and really, Wally never should’ve doubted him. His best bro would never go out with a whimper- he’s too dramatic to ever settle for less than a planet-sized bang. 

“Pardon me.” They all jump, even the batboys, and they all four turn toward Alfred. “Perhaps, if you are staying off the street for the rest of the night,” he nods to the boys, “and your business is finished,” a look to him and Donna, “then you would all be amenable to refreshments and conversation upstairs.”

He waits a split-second for Donna to nod. “Of course, Alfred! I’d be a fool to ever turn down free food from the best cook in this hemisphere.” 

“We’d be delighted, Alfred,” Donna agrees full-heartedly. 

“We’ll be up in a sec, Alf. Gotta change.” Jason then heads in the direction of the showers. Tim follows fast behind. 

This day really does just keep getting better and better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the record, I have nothing against Starfire, she was my favorite in the '03 cartoon. She gets kicked out bc I needed a way for Roy to get there fast, but also this is a Fab Five meeting only, so rip.


	12. Tim- Getting Down to Business

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not my best, but I need setup for the excuse for sibling bonding where no one can run away. You'll see.

Sitting at the dining table with Jason, Wally, and Donna is surprisingly easy. With patrol cut so short he’s not even tired. It probably helps that he’s been getting more sleep lately due to Jason’s hovering. Who knew Jay had it in him to be such a mother hen? 

They’ve been making light conversation for the past few minutes, but mostly just snacking. Once Tim’s heartbeat has calmed down from the confrontation downstairs, he begins to replay what was said, and comes up with some questions he can more safely press now than he could before. He clears his throat to get their attention.

“So, you never said. How did you find out? Did Dick contact you?”

“No,” Donna answers. “The call you made to all us Titans was worded oddly, and it’s been bothering me the whole time. I thought I was being ridiculous, but it just kept bothering me, so I called in the guys.” She shrugs and looks at Wally, who looks at her with fondness.

“At first we were skeptical,” he says. “All of us got the same weird feeling after we compared notes though, and one thing led to another. If Donna hadn’t pressed, we probably would’ve let it go, I mean, I was certainly trying not to think about it.”

“Okay, but what was the missing puzzle piece?” Tim asks impatiently. He was a little miffed that it was his own awkward phrasing that got them looking, but it’s not like he got this job by being good at talking to people. 

The two older heroes hesitate. They look at each other, but Wally turns to look Tim dead in the eye, and he expects an answer, but Wally asks him a counter-question instead.

“Did any of you actually read Dick’s will?”

Tim did not expect that. It also happens that Tim did not read it because he didn’t need to know what Dick’s last words to him would be. He might’ve been curious, but Dick was fine, so it hadn’t been a priority and Tim has so many other things to do. Jason looks impassive, but Tim thinks he might be just as caught off-guard by virtue of how much he’s fiddling with his belt loops under the table. Neither of them ends up answering the question and their silence is telling.

“We’ll just say that what we know is in it, and what was executed, were noticeably different and leave it at that.” 

“Anyway,” Donna says cheerfully. “What else have you been up to?”

“Weeellll,” Jason says slowly. He gives Tim a look and at first Tim doesn’t know what he wants to tell them that he’d want a second- ooohhhh. That is such a bad idea. He glares at Jason to make his point, but his brother makes a ‘why not’ kind of expression. Maybe it’s more of a ‘what do we have to lose’ look, and Tim considers. Donna and Wally have connections that the family doesn’t, so maybe it would be beneficial to float it past them. Jason asks for Tim’s decision with his eyes. Alright, fine, he’s sold. Tim nods imperceptivity. 

“Either of you know any weird ways that people have come back from the dead?”

The looks on their faces are comical, and Tim stifles a smirk. “It’s a serious question.”

“A serious question, he says, like that’s a totally normal thing to ask,” Wally says, exasperated.

“Hmmm. Hmmmmmmmm”

“Don you’re not helping at all.”

“HHMMMM”

Wally shakes his head at her. Tim can admit that they are at least entertaining to watch. Wally huffs, then lazily looks at Jason.

“The weirdest one I ever heard about was Ollie. I think he got vaporized by a bomb and a bit of him stuck to Superman’s cape. The ghost of Hal Jordan used the lantern ring to reform him before kickin’ it to the astral plane or something.”

“Oh my gods,” Donna wheezes. 

That was…Tim must have underestimated them; this is the third time in less than an hour that they’ve managed to surprise him. He blames Jason for being off his game. No one should expect peak performance when they won’t even let him have his required amount of coffee.

“Are green power rings able to reliably bring people back?” Tim asks.

“I don’t know kid, that’s not my jurisdiction. You should ask a lantern.” 

“Is there one you’d recommend I ask?”

“Um,” Wally pauses. “If I’m remembering right Kyle is planet-side right now, so you could ask him. Y’know what? Let me make a call.” He zips out of the room before Tim can respond.

“Don’t mind him,” Donna says. “He’s just making sure that Rayner is actually around and willing to talk to you.” Tim can sense the implied other times when Wally did not call ahead, but he refrains from asking.

“Hey birds! Does tomorrow morning work for you?” Wally yells from the next room.

“How early?” Jason yells back.

“’Bout nine!”

“Yeah sure!”

Tim supposes that’s that then. They have a lead and an appointment. Donna and Wally leave shortly after, and they both make sure to bid Alfred a warm farewell. Tim notes that Donna whispers something to Alfred, he can’t make it out, nor what the man says in reply, but whatever Alfred says makes Donna smile. When he faintly hears the front door shut after them, he turns to Jason. 

Jason proceeds to cut him off before Tim even opens his mouth. “Go to bed.”

“No,” he says. There is research to be done. He has to compile what exactly he needs to ask and write it out and he only has tonight to do it. It’s already 1:30, their meeting is less than eight hours away, there’s no time for sleeping. 

“You at least have to take a nap. A real one, not a power nap.” Jason puts his hand over Tim’s face when he starts to protest. “I know there’s work to do, I know the stakes, I don’t care. I’ll wake you up in ninety minutes. No more, but no less. Nod if you understand.”

Tim tries to turn his head away, but Jason just uses his other hand to hold Tim’s face. He decides to bite but Jason only rolls his eyes. Bastard.

“One and a half hours. Do. You. Understand.”

Could he get out of this if he really wanted? Yes. Could he do so without pissing Jason off or doing something risky? Probably not, and while he’s not physically tired, he is emotionally drained. Too many things have happened tonight that he didn’t anticipate and he’s feeling a little off kilter. A nap does sound nice…

He nods.

Jason’s eyes soften. Then, he leans back in his chair to disengage, waves his hand around in a dismissive gesture. Tells Tim to scram like it will salvage his reputation after pulling such a _Dick_ move. 

The meeting with Kyle Rayner goes well, all things considered. Jason did wake him up like he promised, so Tim had time to draft his questions to make sure he had all his bases covered. His brother wasn’t going with him for this, Red Hood wasn’t trying to press his luck by walking around Justice League HQ, so Tim wanted to quintuple check that he wasn’t forgetting anything. 

His carefully considered questionnaire turned out to be largely unnecessary; Tim had only asked if resurrection was possible via green power rings and had immediately been told that the best bet to bring someone back from the dead was, in fact, a violet ring. A star-sapphire ring. Rayner told Tim that his own death had been made void by a star-sapphire, but he didn’t know much about them. When Tim asked him who would, he’d been pointed in Guy Gardner’s direction, as he’d worn one for a brief period years ago. 

Gardner wasn’t around very often, but Kyle telepathically sent an inquiry. He wasn’t available to come to earth. At Tim’s disappointment Kyle explained that the rings can store information, and every green lantern has access to everyone’s info. If Tim wrote his questions down, Guy could answer them when he got a free moment. 

“When would that be, exactly?”

“Dinnertime,” Kyle says after a moment of consultation. So, Tim quickly alters his questionnaire to ask about star-sapphire ring powers instead. The only thing left to do is wait.

Tim spends the down time scrolling through databases trying to find anything he can about the violet lantern corp. There is surprisingly little about them, either in the JL systems or the Batcomputer files. The only concrete data Tim can find is that the star-sapphires are mostly, if not all, women, and that the rings are powered by love. The JL used to have a contact in Carol Ferris, but she hasn’t been seen in years. Violet power rings are speculated to be able to bring a recently dead loved one back, but ultimately, it’s just speculation on the official reports. 

Despite the lackluster results of his research Tim can feel that he’s on the right track. Dick had told him, and Bruce had grudgingly agreed, that half of detective work was just having good instincts and following up with them. Tim was already excellent at making connections, obviously, but he’d learned a lot his first years as robin. Like that walking into a case trying to prove yourself right leads to confirmation bias, makes you miss things, and that’s dangerous. The feeling that made him walk in to investigate in the first place, though? Tim was taught to hold onto that. 

With nothing left to find and two hours to kill, Tim calls Jason to update him. Jason listens patiently, then pointedly asks Tim if he’s eaten since breakfast. Tim says yes, like a liar, and his brother has the audacity to tell him he's bad at lying. Tim makes a noise of offense, but before he can get a word in Jason orders him to eat something and hangs up. 

The Justice League cafeteria is loud, and Tim wants to be doing anything other than be here. He could be working on Gotham cases. He could be doing anything productive instead of waiting in line for late lunch. Food in hand, he’s about to skulk off to the metaphorical rafters when he spots Question. 

Tim loves talking to The Question. Everyone in his family hates when he talks to The Question. His family is not here, he’s got time to kill; Tim talks to The Question. 

Bruce doesn’t like Question because he’s got dubious ethics- his status as a Justice League affiliate is almost constantly influx and he makes everyone uncomfortable with his constant philosophizing and distrust of power systems. The rest of them don’t like him because Tim always comes home talking about wild conspiracy theories. Cass tells Tim that he once asked for a blood sample after a talk with Question, and when asked why he said, ‘to test for snake heritage in case we really are lizard people.’ Tim has no recollection of this event but does admit that if it was after the sixty-five-hour mark of no sleep, anything is possible. 

Cass still sends him pictures of snakes captioned ‘it me’ on occasion. It’s very embarrassing but mostly annoying. 

Anyway, talking with Question is good for staving off complacency. He finishes his meal feeling energized and sharp. It’s even a reasonable time to check in on Kyle.

Every question has an answer. Reading through it’s already obvious that some of them are more riddle than helpful answer. No one should expect different of the space cops, he supposes. Good thing Tim likes riddles.

When he gets back to his apartment, it’s more like his and Jason’s at this point, Jay is waiting for him with coffee and grabby hands. Tim hands him the papers with all the information he got, then looks at the coffee on the counter with skepticism. 

“I thought I wasn’t allowed to have coffee in your presence?” 

“I never said that,” Jason scoffs. “I said you have to cut down. I know how shit the watchtower’s coffee is, so I thought you deserved something nice. I was wrong, this is mine now little red.” He grabs the coffee.

“No!” Tim seizes the cup right out of Jason’s hands and cradles it against his chest. “I’m sorry, you’re the best.”

“That’s more like it. So, what’s the initial impression? Would we be able to bring the kid back without any…issues?”

“Not with a green ring. We need a violet one, but according to this they’re all on planet Zamaron.” 

Jason glances at the intel. After seemingly deciding to read it later he asks, “Have you figured out how long it would take to get there?”

“A week if we take a javelin.”

“So we need two weeks, clearance for a JL spaceship, and the body. Am I missing anything, Timmy?”

Tim hesitates. Jason looks up and narrows his eyes at Tim.

“Spit it out.”

“I think we should pull Dick,” he says in a rush. Jason blinks at him. Tim doesn’t like how Jason’s looking at him, sizing him up, predatory almost. It feels like lost progress. Maybe that’s just his assessment face, but Tim doesn’t appreciate being put under assessment. 

“I’m not disagreeing with you,” he says neutrally. “I was gonna suggest grabbin’ ‘im anyway. He’d be livid if we went ‘n brought ‘is baby back without ‘im.” Accent prominent and eyes hard Jason looks at Tim like he’s judging his soul. It makes Tim want to squirm, mostly because he doesn’t know what this is about. He doesn’t _understand_ the intensity in his brother’s eyes. Tim refuses to be afraid, Jason doesn’t scare him anymore, but he’s at a loss here.

“Jason?”

Jason’s eyes flash, but the green is gone as quick as it came. He sounds tense when he says, “Tell the head honcho that we know how to bring his demon spawn back. Bitch is predictable, he’ll sound the alarms, and if he knows what’s good for him he’ll come clean about Dickiebird. If not…” 

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” Tim says softly.

The next day, Tim tells a very unsurprised Bruce that he found a way to, probably, safely bring back Damian. Bruce predictably calls everyone to the cave. 

“We found a way to bring Damian back to life.” Everyone acts appropriately surprised, except for Steph whose gasp is entirely too dramatic. Bruce ignores the clamor in the room and continues, “This mission will take two weeks at the shortest, and-“

“We’re all going, right?” Stephanie asks brazenly. It’s probably fair; she usually gets to take care of the city while other people go places, and she’s one of the only people here who genuinely liked the kid while he was around. Better to press while everyone is witness. Bruce looks annoyed at being interrupted, but he didn’t reprimand her. 

“Yes. Everyone is suiting up for this.” His tone insinuates he won’t take no for an answer. He looks at everyone for confirmation, the girls nod their assent and so do he and Jason. 

Barbara’s here on video call, so she says, “I’m allowed to go, right?” Her question isn’t really a question, and Bruce doesn’t like to be challenged, but he’s not dumb enough to argue with her. 

“Of course,” he says. “That’s six then, Tim put in a request for a mid-size passenger ship.”

“Hey,” Jason interrupts. His posture is casual, lazy even, but Tim is right next to him and can see how sharp his eyes are. Moment of truth.

“Aren’t you forgetting someone, old man?” This is it, Bruce’s last out before they give the game away. Tim finds himself hoping that B takes it. 

“No.” His voice is harsh, but with none of the warning tone it would have if he knew where this was going. Tension is rising in the room, all but one of them bracing themselves for the fallout of Jason’s next words. Jason rises, stands at his full height. He looks at B dead on. 

“Bruce. Stop lying,” he growls. Bruce gives him an unimpressed stare.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about Jason,” he says impassively. Toneless as they may be these words hold the warning Tim didn’t find earlier. Bruce knows his charade is up but doesn’t know how many of them already know. Doesn’t know it’s all of them.

“Then I’ll spell it out for you.” Everyone seems to hold their breath. The cave is silent; he sees Cass reach for Steph’s hand, and Tim is on the edge of his seat. Bruce stands like a wall, unshakable and impenetrable, and Jason raises his chin defiantly.

“Call Dick.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun dun dun...
> 
> p.s. I love reading Tim but writing him is stressful he always feels ooc


	13. Cass- Closer to the Line Than Ever Before

Batman bristles. When they started, he was Bruce. He was relieved and excited to bring back Damian, Cass could tell. When Steph asked to help, his face had not liked being interrupted, but his body said that he liked that she cared about Damian too. 

Then Jason brought up Dick. He’s not Bruce’s careful edges and soft center now. He is Batman’s hard lines and immovable core. He was shocked, though it was hard for her to tell. This was about to get bad, but Steph had told her before that she shouldn’t interrupt. Jason had things he deserved to say that Bruce needed to hear. All she can do now is watch. 

Jason is all forward momentum. “Telling your supposed family that one of our own is dead is fucked up Bruce! Have you finally stopped pretending that we’re family at all now since Dick isn’t here to pull us together? Did you ever care at all or just gaslight us until we fought for you? Do any of us mean anything- you threw your favorite to the wolves! You manipulative bastard! You don’t trust us at all!” 

“I do. Just not with everything.” Batman is sturdy and unmoving. His tone is cold like an ice cube down Cassandra’s back. Jason’s words moved and pushed like they had weight that could knock Batman over. Batman does not falter at all, does not snap back at Jason. He is angry, but he’s gathering it up in a knot while Jason is letting it fill all his in between spaces. “I can’t, when you act like this,” Batman says.

Jason’s anger moves through him and he moves with it. He does not move closer to Batman, but he uses his arms and torso and whole body to speak, unlike before when he was mostly just yelling. “When I act like this? What about you? What about you! Expecting us to roll over on command when you’re willing to lie about this!”

“What I mean,” Batman says with restraint. “Is that you want him to leave the mission incomplete. Something like this is exactly what I was trying to avoid.”

“Bringing your son back from the dead is more important than the mission, Bruce!” Jason’s eyes have flecks of too bright green. Cass hopes he won’t hurt himself. If he forgets to keep breathing, she will help him, no matter what anyone says. 

“Damian will have all the support he needs here. He doesn’t need Dick, but the mission needs completed.”

“Do you hear yourself!” Jason cries. “Fine then! Dick loves the kid, loves him so goddamn much! Are you seriously so heartless that you’d lie about someone so important to him? Oh wait, that’s exactly what you’ve done to all of us, glad to know that you treat all of our feelings as equally dismissible.”

“Jason,” Batman grits out. He’s so tense. Everything Batman says comes out like a shield. Like he will not bend because he knows he is safe. Secure in his rightness, even though Cass wonders if he really thinks he is. Does he see how everyone around them droops more and more? Does he see how sadly their shoulders are set? How disappointed their postures are? Jason is furious, but it’s hurt under all that rage, like always but deeper. Jason is more deeply hurt than Cass has ever seen him. Tim and Steph are too. Cass cannot for the life of her tell if Bruce sees; no matter where she looks, she can’t tell if he _cares_.

She’s missed whatever Batman said after Jason’s name. She does not miss Jason’s response, or how openly betrayed his expression is. From the horror on Tim’s face he can see it too. Jason is shaking with hurt and anger.

“How dare you. Things I don’t know? Well if there’s anything I know intimately it’s what shitty parenting feels like! This is so beyond that it would be laughable if it wasn’t so stupid! How can you call yourself a father, how can you call yourself a hero?”

“I’ve never called myself a hero. Other people do that. Batman is a symbol.”

“A symbol of what? Right now, all I see is a symbol of cruelty!”

“Isn’t that more what you were going for?” Batman asks it in the same monotone he’s said anything else, but his balance shifted forward before he said it- he wanted it to cut. Cass knows he’s succeeded because Jason stops short. There is a single instant where no one breathes.

Jason’s eyes glow unearthly green; full, bright, dangerous, and Cass is about to move to help, but Jason surprises her. He takes a full breath, then takes another one. He squares his shoulders and the green dims a lot. He takes a single step forward towards Batman. 

“I want a real answer about why you don’t trust us. Don’t wanna trust me? Fine. You got some hang-ups about Steph too, but Tim? Barbara? Cass? There is no excuse you can give that doesn’t make you an awful person, but I want to hear you try.” His tone is so low. It’s the most aggressive Cass has ever heard him, maybe one of the most aggressive voices she’s ever heard her whole life. The sound hurts. 

“I don’t have to explain myself to you. I don’t answer to you, we are not equals, and this has gone far enough. Dick chose to go. Pulling him from the mission is dangerous, it’s idiotic, and your inability to stay objective is exactly why I didn’t tell you. None of you are good secret keepers, not from each other, and it’s a security risk I refused to take with Dick’s safety. Extracting him for weeks on end is also an unnecessary risk that will not be taken.” He pauses to make eye contact with all four of them in the room. “You will report how you found out about Dick’s status tomorrow. Later, we will discuss the important issue this meeting was for before Hood threw a tantrum. You are all dismissed.”

As he walks away, Cass sees that he feels bad about fighting. He’s worried about Dick and impatient to get Damian back, and he’s mad that he has to wait to do so now. Batman is sunken like he did the wrong thing, wants to try again, but knows it’s not the best decision right now. 

But. She also sees how dim Steph is when she’s usually so bright. She sees Tim with a…a…hollow? That sounds right. A hollow expression and extremely sad eyes. She sees Jason’s tapping toes and fiddling hands and bobbing Adam’s apple. Cass takes Steph’s hand, then nods at the boys while squeezing. Steph gets the message and marches toward Tim and Jason. She takes Jason’s hand first, then shoves it into one of Tim’s, and shoves the hand that isn’t holding Cass’s into Tim’s free one. Cass catches Jason’s other hand before he can step away. 

The circle of hand holding is probably weird, but she doesn’t know if any of them can stand a hug right now. She just knows that they need to stay together, need to hold onto each other, and this is fine because even if it’s weird, it’s comfortable. She thinks of Dick, and how he wouldn’t hesitate to hold them close, she thinks his body would loudly say love and affection and amusement if he could see them now. She thinks of Bruce’s regret as he walked away, and how she could see it, but the others couldn’t, and the amount of things she sees that they don’t.

Cass starts deciding that it doesn’t matter how obvious it is to her eyes; her siblings can’t see it, and it hurts them. Sometimes words are very hard, but she tries anyway because she loves these people, and she has gotten better. Bruce has not gotten much better since she first met him, and she thinks maybe he doesn’t try as hard as he could. He’s hurting her family because he’s not trying, he loves them too but hurts them on purpose sometimes, and Cass can’t bring herself to decide that his behavior is unacceptable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wack


	14. Dick- Reunion

He’s on his way out of the British Isles when he senses the shadow. After some consideration, he ducks into an empty side street. Best to confront them now than have them follow him all the way to his partner’s location. Once alone he can faintly hear the softest sound of breathing, and then to Dick’s surprise, a wadded-up paper ball drops in front of him. By the time he looks up any sign of company is gone; no breathing and no footfalls, and he can’t sense their presence like he could in the street. All that trouble for nothing but a note. 

Pulling out gloves to put on before touching the mystery paper is the only precaution Dick takes before smoothing out the note to read. He is not prepared for what it says.

_Dick_  
_Come home. Needed for a mission about little brother._  
_Love Cass_

Short, sweet, and absolutely no regard for secret identities. Dick loves his sister. It’s unfortunate she didn’t stick around so he could see her, but it was the right call, and he would see her soon anyway. It would’ve been nice for her to specify how long he needed to leave though. If Bruce was recalling him without any warning he probably wasn’t needed for long, a few days to get in and out should be enough. If not, they would have to figure it out later. Right now, he had to meet up with Helena and convince her to cover for him.

Helena is not pleased that he wants to bail for mysterious reasons. It takes two hours and promises of a very nice thank-you dinner on him, but he manages to convince her to lay low for a week. She tells him that he has exactly seven days to do whatever he needs to starting right this minute, so he better get gone. Dick moves quickly.

He had intended to go to Milan tonight instead of Gotham. Dick almost wanted to be bitter on principle, he’d only been to Italy once when he was too young to really remember it and he’d been looking forward to the trip, but duty called. Family called, really, and if it was important enough for Cass to message him in person then it was important enough that Dick could get over himself. 

Normally, Dick would be worried right about now. Urgently pulled from an undercover op to participate in a mission about one of his brothers; it raises just about every red flag it can. However, no matter how often his siblings forget, he does not, in fact, jump into danger with no forethought because he’s emotional. He’s been a crimefighter for almost twenty years, he knows how to analyze a situation, and this situation is nothing to panic over. Cassandra, their best fighter, personally found him out in the street. She didn’t stick around to escort him, so there was no instant transport waiting to cut down travel time. That she was there at all meant that it wasn’t the urgent kind of ‘all-hands-on-deck’ because otherwise she would be in Gotham fighting the problem. Nothing about this felt like one of his brothers was in imminent danger. 

Fairly confident that his two remaining brothers were not in mortal peril, Dick spent the flight to Gotham napping. Who knows when next he’ll be able to sleep this many hours in a row?

To Dick’s surprise and delight, Jason is waiting for him at the airport. He grins brightly at the sight of the younger man, and Jason waves to him. He’s got a car instead of his usual bike, and Dick settles in the passenger seat with minimal fuss. He’s about to go for the standard catching up questions, but he gets sidetracked when he realizes Jason isn’t driving toward the manor. He’s not on track to get to any Bat approved base at all, in fact. 

“Hey, Jay? Where are we going?”

“Somewhere.” Stellar.

“Not that I’m not cool with being whisked away, but I like to know where I’m being whisked away to, yeah?” 

“Look,” Jason huffed. Dick did not like how tense his brother was. Maybe Dick should’ve been more worried on the flight over. “There are some things we need to talk about.”

Dick fills with dread for half a second before he has a moment of clarity. Jason probably just has something he wants to say but doesn’t want to say it where Bruce could overhear, and it’s a relief to know that’s all this is about. It is not a relief to know that Jason is hiding things from Bruce, but even though they’d been getting better before he left, he can’t imagine they’d covered much ground in the ‘making up’ department. Dick knows that Jay’s aversion isn’t as bad a sign as it could be, so he softens his body language as much as he can.

“Alright,” he shrugs. “Can I at least get a preview of what we’re hiding from B?” Dick asked lightly. Jason’s hands tighten on the steering wheel. Bingo. 

“The fuck you on about?” Jay asked tersely. 

“Not like we’re going anywhere sanctioned, and that means that we ‘need to talk’ about things you want kept on the down low. So, at least tell me how emotionally prepared I need to be for this.”

Jason’s face does a little twist around the edges; something about his expression defensive, from being so easily figured out maybe, but there’s something else that’s…well…Dick wants to call it protective. Being protective isn’t a new thing for Jason, he goes so far because he cares a lot, but in this context it’s unsettling. Dick doesn’t know who needs to be protected in this scenario, and it throws him a bit off-balance. Cass’s note said brother, is Tim in more trouble than he thought? What he would really like is for Jason to answer him, but he doesn’t seem inclined to do so anytime soon; they just keep driving.

Eventually, thank goodness, the car comes to a stop in front of a little gas station outside of city limits. It doesn’t seem to be open, but that’s Tim’s bike outside, and he’s got a feeling this isn’t going to be a private conversation between him and Jason. It makes him feel a little better about the whole thing because even if it went sideways Dick will be glad to see his brothers. He's missed his family so much.

Dick is unbuckling when Jason sets his hand on top of Dick's. Dick tilts his head in question, and Jason looks away for just a tic, then forces his eyes to meet Dick’s. 

“A lot,” he says hoarsely. Scowls, clears his throat and tries again. “How emotionally prepared you need to be, a lot.” Well dang. He smiles at Jason anyway. 

“Thanks for the heads up.” Dick finally undoes his seatbelt and gets out of the car, glances to make sure Jason isn’t looking at him and shakes himself out a bit. It won’t do anyone any good to walk in without his head in the game. Hands in his pockets, he walks backwards toward the front door and tells Jay to hurry up. 

When Jay catches up Dick spins on his heel and they walk in together. As Dick walks in he sees that it’s not just Tim here, it’s the girls too. It might as well be a regular sibling reunion; he can’t even remember the last time they were all in the same room together, but he can admit that a part of him settles at being able to see that they all seem safe and well. 

Three heads turn to assess the new arrivals, and Dick gets three different smiles aimed at him when they register who it is. It should be embarrassing how incredibly relieved he is that they aren’t mad at him. 

“Hey,” Dick says cheerily, “Long time no see.” 

Tim moves first. As soon as he decides that it really is Dick in front of him, he launches himself at his brother. Dick wraps Tim up tight and bends to hide his face in Tim’s hair. 

Dick whispers, “I missed you,” against the top of Tim’s head, and he feels Tim hold tighter, like none of this will turn out to be real if he lets go. “So much,” he mumbles. He feels Tim shake, small tremors wracking his little brother's frame. Dick waits for Tim to pull away first, content to hold him until Tim is ready to let go and not a moment before. 

Cass must decide she doesn’t want to wait that long because she nestles against Dick’s left side and throws one arm around Dick’s waist and another around Tim. Dick turns to rest his cheek against Tim’s hair so he can look at her.

“Hey you,” he says softly. She rolls her eyes at him, so he must be unbearable levels of fond, but the tilt of her lips is a smile that’s just as fond so it’s alright. Steph nearly crashes into his other side. She throws her arms around his neck and squeezes hard once, then repositions so she’s hugging him and Tim and in contact with Cass. 

“Had me worried for a sec, jerk.” There’s no malice in it though.

“Well that’s just not right,” he says just as playfully. “My sincerest apologies, Miss Brown.”

“Lucky for you I’m willing to forgive such a scandalous slight Mr. Grayson,” she says, just a touch too sincere to get the haughty effect she was going for. 

“How gracious,” he responds, light yet earnest.

Steph twists around and yells, “Jason, get your zombie ass over here! This is a group hug and requires full group participation.” 

Dick hears Jason sigh, but it sounds like exasperation, not disagreement. When Jason appears at his back Dick is officially trapped between his loved ones; he uncurls a bit and leans into Jason’s wider frame, enjoys the warmth at his back. He tilts his head up and begins to stage whisper.

“So, kids been giving you the run around?”

Jason huffs and rests his chin on Dick’s shoulder. “No wonder you’re such a dickhead, are we always this annoying?”

“Yes,” he deadpans. Any sting it might’ve had is ruined when Dick starts snickering immediately after. Jason hides his face against Dick’s collarbone and Dick would bet his trust fund that it’s to hide a grin. 

The moment is as close to perfect as Dick’s had in a long time. He’s surrounded by family, they’re not angry or fighting, he’s safe, he’s warm, he feels loved. Like this, Dick can pretend that everything is right in the world, just for a little bit. 

The moment breaks when Tim backs off. Not much, but enough for Dick to notice and he lets the little bird go. Cass and Steph follow, but Jason hesitates. Not much, but again, just enough for Dick to notice. Dick turns around and pulls Jason into a real hug. They’ve got business to attend to, so the hug doesn’t last long, but Dick tells Jason, “I’m glad you’re here,” before pulling away. He can practically hear Jason trying to think of something to say and it makes Dick smirk. 

“So,” he addresses the room. “I love you all and missed you dearly, but why am I necessary for whatever is going on?”

No one answers for a second and Dick wants to chide them for not electing a spokesperson beforehand, but he decides they can be forgiven for the stumble when Steph tells him what this is about. 

“You needed to be here,” Steph starts, “because it’s about Damian.” Dick’s heart skips a beat, but he forces himself to listen. Steph continues, “We found a way to bring him back that won’t hurt him. Bruce has everyone packed to leave tomorrow.”

Dick drops to crouch. His eyes are wide, but he can feel the grin forming on his face. This is so much better than he could’ve asked for, an emergency summons could mean anything; to have it mean getting his brother back is incredible. He’s so happy he could sing. He stands back up and looks Steph in the eye. Dick’s smile feels like it could split his face, and when he smiles at Steph her answering grin is just as bright. 

Tim and Damian started getting better before the end. Jason was finding his footing with everyone still, including the youngest. Dames had respected Cass and liked her well enough when she was around, but Cass wasn’t around very often. Stephanie though? Damian was her robin, and she filled the slot of fun older sibling that Dick couldn’t fill when he was in the cowl instead of the finger stripes. If there was anyone who Dick could really share his joy with, it’s her. 

Jay’s voice snaps him out of his bubble of excitement. “Blue bird, you don’t even know what the plan is, tone down the sunshine before I go blind.” 

It only makes Dick feel brighter, though for the sake of his brother’s intolerance of sunny people he manages to tone down his expression instead of laugh like he wants to. “You’re right,” he concedes. “So what is the plan then? Lay it on me.”

“We’re going to use a violet power ring,” Tim says. “Do you know anything about them?”

Dick brightens again without even noticing. “The ones the Star-Sapphires use? Heck yeah, I know all sorts of stuff about the violet corps, I love them. Did someone ask a Star-Sapphire here or are we goin’ to Zamaron?” 

From Tim’s expression, he gathers that Tim did not expect Dick to be on board right away, or maybe he just didn’t expect Dick to know what he was talking about. He recovers rapidly though, answers, “The plan is to take a Javelin to Zamaron. With so much ambient violet energy we’re hoping it should eliminate the risk of any ‘complications’ there could be.”

Dick nods. Sounds like solid logic to him. He should ask though, “Who’s wearing the ring?”

“Hopefully you,” Tim answers quickly.

“Makes sense.” Then Dick realizes that the others in the room look as if they didn’t know that Dick was the planned ring bearer. 

“Makes sense?” Cass asks.

“Yeah,” Dick says easily. “The ring is powered by love. To resurrect someone, you have to love them with everything you have. The bone deep, ‘I’m yours, you’re mine’ kind of love. I already love my family with everything I am, and since I’m used to giving my whole heart away anyway, it makes sense that it’d go smoothest if I used the ring.” 

Cass looks like she understands now, which is good. Tim and Jason are looking at him like he might be crazy, which is not so good. He almost asks if he’s got something on his face, if only to cut the tension, but he gives them time to find the words they need to say. Jason recovers first.

“Give your heart away, huh?” Jason asks. Dick thinks it might be bitterness in his tone, and Dick suddenly knows what this is about. 

“Jay, I tried really fucking hard to not like you at all, and you know what happened? Every time I saw your annoying nerd face, I couldn’t help but like you anyway. I called you Robin one time and then it was like I loved you more every day.” He pauses and sees that Jason’s eyes are wide. He keeps going just to make sure Jay’s got the picture. “I loved you, and I loved you more every time I saw you, and then you were dead. You get it through your head right now though that when I found out you were back and an even bigger asshole than you used to be, I still loved you. You were family back then, and you’re still family now, and I’m going to love you until the sun explodes. So yeah, my whole heart, Little Wing.”

Jason looks into the middle distance like his whole life might be a lie, so Dick turns away from him and zeroes in on Tim. Timmy had looked jaded a second ago, but now he looks downright nervous. He didn’t need to be, Dick had messed up with him, and they hadn’t talked about it yet, so the really important stuff could wait until they didn’t have an audience. That didn’t mean that Dick couldn’t say anything.

“You and I have a lot to talk about, Tumbleweed. All I’m going to say is that even though I can’t seem to find the right words or ask the right questions- even though I fuck it up every time I try, I do love you. I love you so much it hurts to breathe, Tim, and that has never wavered.”

Tim looks away, but he’s blushing so Dick thinks they’re okay for now. Dick decides to take pity on both of them and change the subject. 

“How long is the timeline for this mission?”

“Two weeks,” Steph says. Not an acceptable answer. 

“What makes up the majority of that time?” 

“It’s mostly travel time,” Tim cuts in. “Why?”

“I’ve only got a week for this, so I needed to know. If it’s just travel time though then we can cut it down so I’m back in time to keep cover.”

Tim squints suspiciously. “How? There’s no way to get us all there and back faster than a javelin, and it takes a week both ways.” 

“There’s a boom tube in storage in the Watchtower,” Dick shrugs nonchalantly. “It’s for an emergency and or special occasion, so we take a week to get to Zamaron and bring back Dami, then we boom tube it home so that Dames can be home right away.” 

“Great!” Steph says.

“Wait,” Tim says, at the same time. “They’re really just going to let us use the very important instant transport device because we asked nicely?”

“No, they’re going to let us use the important instant transport device because _I_ asked them nicely. If I say pretty please it’ll be fine.”

Jason’s eyebrows raise so high they almost disappear behind his fringe. “Awfully arrogant. Besides, aren’t you forgetting something, dickhead?”

Tim says, “You’re still supposed to be dead.”

“I know, but really, all I have to do is ask Clark, maybe Diana, and they won’t tell anyone. Oh, speaking of, Tim who did you tell? Clearly everyone here, but who else?”

“Other than the people in this room, the only people who know you’re alive are Alfred, Barbara, annnnnnnn…..” he stalls on the last word, like he really doesn’t want to say. Understandable, since Dick can’t think of anyone else in Gotham who would know. Maybe Kate?

“Just tell me,” he encourages.

“The Titans know.” That was not what Dick expected Tim to say. He couldn’t say he wasn’t relieved that his friends weren’t mourning him, but he would like to know how that came about. First, he needed some clarification. 

“Tim-tam, when you say Titans, which Titans know that I’m fine?”

“Donna, Garth, Wally, and Roy.” 

Dick let’s out a distressed sound before he could stop himself. 

“What? What’s wrong?” Tim asks, a little panicked.

“Nothing,” Dick says. He half-smiled, affection mixing with exasperation as he says, “Nothing, except that if you told all of them, that means everyone whose ever been a Titan and is currently in this dimension knows about it. I’m not mad, really I’d rather they know, but just fyi, if you tell the quartet something, you’ve effectively told everyone with a Titans communicator.”

“How do you mean?”

“The Titans are friends, that’s the whole point. So, if something important happens, we spread the word as wide as we can because it sucks to be out of the loop. I’m gonna go ahead and assume you didn’t tell them to keep it to themselves.”

“I didn’t think I needed to,” Tim hisses. “I thought it was pretty obvious that they shouldn’t go around telling people. They said they didn’t want you to get hurt-“

“They don’t,” Dick says firmly. “People talk, though, but you didn’t do anything wrong Timmy. I’m not worried about it, so you don’t need to be either.”

Tim huffs, but relents. Dick grins at him, then switches gears again. Asks something that’s been bothering him since he was in Jason’s car. 

“Anyone want to tell me why we’re talking about all of this here instead of the Manor? I still don’t know what you’re hiding from B.”

No one answers him. Cass looks to Steph, but Steph looks down, casting occasional glances at Tim. Tim catches her eye and immediately swings to Jason. Jay throws up his hands.

“Fine,” he grumbles. “Big D, we didn’t mention it before, but the old man doesn’t know that you’re here.”

“He doesn’t know I’m here?”

“No. In fact, he specifically told us not to tell you that we were leaving to bring back the kid.”

Told them not to…no. Dick could understand not pulling him from his assignment, but not telling him at all? Would he have told Dick after Damian was home safe? After it was certain? Dick would like to believe that Bruce is holding off on telling him about this rescue op so as not to get Dick’s hopes up, to keep from distracting him until it was a done deal. Dick would really like to give Bruce the benefit of the doubt.

Bruce didn’t invite him to Jason’s funeral.

Bruce never tells him anything about his siblings, honestly. Not when he brings home another one, not when they’re getting adopted, not when they’re presumed dead. He’s sure he would’ve been the last one to know about Damian if he hadn’t been there. Why would this be any different? 

“I’m going to get reamed tomorrow as soon as he sees me because he told you not to get me. Groovy.” He’s so tired. He was not this tired a minute ago. He wants to take a nap, so he doesn’t have to deal with this. He does manage to quirk his lips up at the guilty shifting he hears. 

“Yeah, whoops.” Good old Steph. 

“Whoops,” Dick repeats wryly. 

“Look,” Jason says. “Who cares? Bruce is a bastard, what else is new? Show up, the brat’s your brother too and you deserve to be there. Hell, you probably deserve to be there more than he does. You already got the time off, might as well use it.” 

Dick did already get the time off. Being trapped on a spaceship with an angry Batman is a price he is willing to pay to get to see Damian again as soon as possible. It’s worth it. 

Jason under sold how emotionally prepared Dick needed to be. Tomorrow is going to suck.


	15. Alfred- Morning of Departure

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's mostly filler, but I'm tired, and it has my favorite line so far.

The young masters and mistresses arrive home in the earliest hours of the morning. Alfred’s breath catches when he sees them: him. Right there, in the middle of the precession, is Richard. Alive and well, just as they had hoped. 

He could say they had known, but they hadn’t, not truly. It was a sour thought that went unspoken, but which lingered in the air. The video footage from that horrid night was proof that Richard lived, but not reassuring in the least as to Richard’s wellbeing. An encrypted note that promised of return was all well and good, yet still a poor substitute to a real check-in. Certainly not enough to soothe an old man’s worries when under normal circumstances Alfred would be able to tend to the hurts himself. 

All of which seemed to matter very little when Richard spotted him. It was obvious in the way the young man’s eyes widened. He quickly paused whatever banter he was exchanging with Jason in order to beeline toward Alfred. The smile on his face was wide, bright, and best of all it was honest. Previously, when days were better more often than they were tragic, Alfred’s eldest grandchild had been color personified. Sunlight in a smile, as Mr. Kent would say. It’s been much longer than two months since Alfred has had the privilege of seeing that particular smile on Richard’s face, and he’s missed it dearly. 

“My boy,” Alfred says. Richard’s eyes crinkle to the point of looking squinted. Every line of Richard’s face reads of a joy that warms Alfred’s heart.

“Hello,” Richard tries to say. His throat is too closed, too choked up, to get the word out right. Alfred couldn’t care less. He rests both hands upon Richard’s shoulders, a solid touch to welcome him home. His charge brings his own hands up to lightly clasp around Alfred’s wrists. If Alfred were only slightly worse at acting, he may have admitted that the contact was to ground himself in the present as much as it was for Richard. 

“Master Richard, it’s incredibly good to see you.”

“Likewise,” Richard says, with more success than last time.

“First thing after breakfast, I expect you in the medical wing, young sir.”

Richard’s expression pinches before smoothing out, and it’s quite obvious that under different conditions he would be teasing Alfred for such an obvious display of concern, but Richard is gracious, or perhaps wary of retribution, enough to let the moment pass. 

“Absolutely, Alfie. Whatever you say.”

Alfred holds on for one last moment, then releases him, and Richard let’s his arms fall in order to step away. 

“Off you pop, Master Richard. Everyone will need to be in top form tomorrow.” He doesn’t look at the children who have been shamelessly watching the scene, but his message is received loud and clear. It is time for bed, and none of them argue with him before making their way up stairs, even those who usually need more persuasion to take a room in the Manor. 

Alfred has no doubt that Bruce does not know his eldest has been summoned. He can’t imagine that the news will be well received, and he dreads to ponder Bruce’s inevitably poor reaction. It’s such a shame, how caught up Bruce has become in his own darkness. Ten years ago, the man would have never even considered sending Richard away immediately after such an intense near miss. Would have tried to keep Richard here to the point of overstepping, even. 

Alas, those days are long past, and Alfred can only indulge in the hope that Bruce sees the errors of his ways before it is too late. 

The morning of departure starts calmly enough. Alfred prepared a veritable feast since the table would have so many occupants, and it would be the last of Alfred’s cooking any of them would get in the coming week. Stephanie had arrived first, dragging a very much still asleep Timothy behind her. Cassandra found her way to the table a fair bit later, and Bruce came into the dining room a few minutes after her.

“Is Jason awake yet?” Bruce grumbled. Cassandra nodded yes, and Bruce seemed satisfied for the time being. The gathered family members began breakfast, piling their plates and thanking Alfred for the food. Alfred himself had eaten a light breakfast beforehand, and he wanted to smile at the peaceful morning scene. His mood was somewhat diminished by his knowledge of what was to come, but for now he would enjoy the clinking of silverware against the plates and the soft chatter around the table. 

Peace lasted for about twenty minutes. Jason and Richard walk in together, talking to each other as if without a care in the world, but both boys are stiff. They walk like they’re stepping into a battlefield, and Alfred doesn’t blame them. If Bruce were anyone else, his jaw would have dropped when he saw Richard. As it stands his jaw only loosens a little, his eyes widen only just, and it’s still obvious to everyone in the room that Bruce is very much shocked.

Richard walks right past him to take a seat by Stephanie on the other end of the table.

Richard chirps, “Good morning,” and puts some fruit on his plate. Alfred makes a note to make sure it isn’t the only thing he takes; Richard tends to stop eating when he’s especially upset, but that can’t be allowed to stand right now. What also shouldn’t be allowed to stand is the way the mood cools alarmingly fast as Bruce trades his surprise for anger, but Alfred won’t interfere unless something truly unspeakable happens. 

Ever the leader, Richard breaks the silence first. “It’s nice to see you, Bruce. I’m getting the feeling that you are not happy to see me. Want to talk about it?” He breaks eye contact and throws a blueberry into the air to catch it with his mouth. When Bruce says nothing, Richard shifts to give him his full attention and raises an eyebrow. It’s a lighthearted gesture on the surface, but it’s so clearly a challenge more than an inquiry, and Alfred wonders if something unspeakable may actually happen. 

“Glaring at me doesn’t tell me the problem, Bruce. It also doesn’t scare me, so try something else.”

“I did not contact you. You’ve compromised the mission-“

“I did not. I’ve got a week to do as I please and-“

“That’s not enough-“

“Time. I know. That’s why we’re going to take the boom tube home instead of flying the whole way. I didn’t know what I was coming home for, thanks to you, so my break was clean and _temporary_ so-“

“Still unacceptable. You’re wasting valuable time when you should be-“

“Wasting time? Resurrecting my brother is not a waste of time!”

“You’re not needed here,” Bruce says harshly. “Since you are, you can tell me why everyone at this table knew about your status. They’ve been lying to me all week.”

“Oh, have they? I wonder why,” Richard says sarcastically.

“Dick. Answer me.”

Richard straightens significantly at the command; if he were standing, he’d surely be at attention. His eyes though, instead alarmed or submissive, are deadly serious. The anger that he’d been building is still present, but Richard is no longer just a child arguing with his father. He addresses Bruce as an equal.

“It’s obvious that I told them. Tell me why it makes you so angry.”

“I explicitly told you that they needed to believe you were dead. You deliberately put yourself in more danger by disobeying me. Do-“

“Stop.” A field command if Alfred’s ever heard one. Bruce stops, and Richard breathes in. 

“C’mon B, you can’t possibly be this mad about me disobeying you,” he raises a hand when Bruce opens his mouth to speak. “No, stop, let me finish. If that’s all this is about then you need to take a step back. I've done things I hate myself for just because you asked me to. I’ve done things that haunt me, because it was an order. I didn’t tell the family as an act of rebellion. It was about standards.”

Bruce growls a bit, but ultimately signals Richard to keep going.

“We used to have lines, Bruce, do you remember? You might not know where yours are anymore but that doesn't mean I've abandoned mine. Faking my death to my own family is a line I decided not to cross. You don't have to like it, but it was my decision to make, and you have to respect that.”

“You’re right, I don’t like it. I think it was foolish," Bruce heaves a sigh. "But what’s done is done. I wanted to keep you as safe as possible, but I can’t force you to stop putting yourself in needless danger.”

“Are you finally acknowledging that, B?” Richard asks playfully. “I thought you’d have learned that by now. Haven’t we gone over this a dozen times?”

“At least,” Bruce says flatly. Nothing has been forgiven, but it’s difficult to stay mad in the face of Richard’s easy charm, and even Bruce is not immune. Richard grins, takes a bite of a piece of bacon, and it seems the matter is settled.

“Wait wait wait wait wait. Wait just a fucking minute. Are you serious? That’s it? He tells you to fuck off because it was his decision and suddenly it’s cool? I can’t even convey how flabbergasted and astonished I am by your favoritism and hypocrisy.” 

Alfred loves Jason, the lad has many admirable qualities and strengths. Unfortunately, exercising tact is not one of those strengths, especially during a delicate situation. The ceasefire Richard just won shatters before Alfred’s very eyes.

Jason is out of his chair with fury, Bruce rising to match him. Richard has elected to hide his head in his hands, Cassandra chooses this moment to hide under the table. Stephanie seems to whisper something urgently to Timothy, and the boy nods in response. Then, to Alfred’s relief, Timothy takes control of the situation before it can spiral any further. 

“Hey!”

Jason and Bruce both pause in their growling. 

Timothy continues, “You two can have this argument at any other time, but we have a very important flight to catch, so we need to eat now instead of argue. We have to be on the same page when we leave for the Watchtower.” Timothy glares at Jason until the young man sits down, then turns to Bruce. “Arguing right now is a waste of energy, and it will make presenting a united front in front of the Justice League more difficult. It’s a wasted effort right now, Bruce. It won’t help the mission.”

Bruce sits down. The rest of breakfast passes quietly. Tense, but quiet. 

True to his word, Richard reports to the medical station immediately after breakfast. He didn’t eat as much as Alfred would like, but after his maneuvering proved to be for not Alfred wasn’t surprised in the least. Richard was physically fine; a few new scars that were in the process of healing well, some new bruising, and some weight loss were all to be expected. The high-stress nature of where he’s been has done him no favors, but it’s done him no real harm. Physically.

Richard confides to Alfred very quietly that he wasn’t sure he’d make it home. The past months have felt more like a fever dream than a mission with an endpoint, and he’d been worried he would never get to see his family again. He hasn’t had any space to feel mad at Bruce, he’s been too busy being relieved that the rest of them haven’t fallen while he was gone, relieved they aren’t mad at him for leaving. 

Alfred’s heart sometimes wants to break for this young man. The world sits so heavily on his lean shoulders, and Alfred can only hope that a week with the rest of the family, warm and alive within reach, will help. He hopes that the return of young Damian will ease some of the sadness that radiates from Richard like an aura when the young man lets his guard down. 

Each Wayne leaves in costume with a duffle bag containing a week’s worth of clothing and rations. Alfred dearly hopes for their swift and safe return. He allows himself one moment of pause, then turns and heads upstairs. Damian’s room needs freshly prepared after all.


	16. Tim- Lovelier Than Usual

Waking up hadn’t hurt today. Tim didn’t have a lot of good days anymore, most days it was hard to get out of bed and weeks sort of blurred together. Okay days weren’t as rare as they used to be; Tim’s been getting more attention lately, Cass and Jay haven’t given him a whole day by himself in weeks, and while it’s sometimes annoying and overwhelming Tim can’t really argue with the fact that he’s doing better than he has in a year. Genuinely good days are still a luxury, days where he isn’t floaty or tired and getting up feels worthwhile. 

Today is a good day. He wakes up warm and comfortable. Tim can’t really tell why; he only rouses the minimum amount to put one foot in front of the other when Steph start pulling him downstairs- stupid morning people- but he thinks he was in Dick’s room.

Isn’t that a pleasant thought? Dick’s room. Because Dick was around to use it. Dick was here so that he could help them bring back Damian, which will make Dick happy. It’s weird that it kind of makes Tim happy too; the demon brat had been an absolute nightmare for months and Tim had been half convinced that the brat single-handedly ruined Tim’s life at one point, but…a lot had happened during the timestream aftermath shuffle. Dami had almost killed Tim many times, and he’s still salty about it, but the baby bat had also saved Tim’s ass a time or two. Without any prompting. Hopefully, if this mission goes well, they can start over, in a way. 

Damian will be home soon. Dick is home. Jason and Cass are too. Tim himself is home, and Steph is a source of comfortable white noise next to him at the table. The coffee in his hands is warm and delicious. Today is a good day.

It gets a little less great when Bruce sees Dick, but Dick is a pro at getting Bruce to save his lectures for later. Sometimes, Dick steps in to postpone a lecture and the lecture never ends up happening at all. Jason is clearly not awake enough to watch his temper, but lucky for everyone Tim is for once. Despite the awkwardness, Tim is still in a fairly good mood after breakfast. He triple checks that he has everything he’ll need for the week, and soon enough the entire family is out the door. Barbara had made a fuss about going, but it was really to save a seat for Dick; she had Birds of Prey to run, Sirens to monitor, and other responsibilities to tend to. 

Could she have put her life on hold for a couple weeks for this? Yes. Did she need to when she’s got dumb robins to do it for her? No. 

There aren’t many people on the Watchtower, so it’s easier than usual to avoid passing anyone on their way to the hangar, even with how many of them there are. Nightwing breaks away from them as they take a right to avoid the control room. Batman doesn’t question him and Tim’s not sure anyone else notices, so Tim hangs back a second to ask where he’s going.

“I’m getting the boom tube, Red. I’ll meet you in the hangar, just don’t let B take off without me.” There’s no tension in the way he walks or in the way he said it, but Tim’s got a feeling that the request is more real than he let on. Superman is on duty right now, and Tim wonders if Nightwing is banking on his surprise that he isn’t dead to get his way, or maybe Nightwing really could take things from the League vault just by asking even under normal circumstances. 

Something he could ask about later. Red Robin quickly catches up to the rest of the bats, and they begin loading their gear onto the javelin. Standard javelins are very fast and only really meant for six people max. They’re used to get leaguers who aren’t outer space proof from point A to point B for emergencies in deep space. The ship that Tim’s family is appropriating is slower, but much roomier; used for intergalactic humanitarian aid and such. 

There’s cold storage in a small room on the bottom level of the ship. It’s where Batman puts Damian’s body. The plan is to thaw it out before the main event, but Tim is not in anyway involved in that process, and he’s glad for it. He’d rather not think about it at all. 

About half and hour later they’re all set to go. Supplies are properly stored, seats have been rearranged and secured for comfortable movement around the upper deck, and the five of them have double checked each other to the point of contempt. Red Robin is ready to tape Hood’s mouth shut, so he’s relieved when Nightwing enters the room and makes his way toward the family. He smiles at Tim and shakes the thing in his hand a bit to show his endeavor has been successful. To Nightwing’s left is Superman, trailing behind Tim’s brother almost protectively. Wing hands the tube off to Spoiler and tells her where to store it, and then it’s Batman and the people he’s legally attached his name to standing in front of a disappointed Kal-El. 

At least, Tim thinks he’s disappointed. His attention is on Batman, and the look on his face is kind of inscrutable, but he doesn’t look mad so Tim’s going with disappointment.

“I’m not going to try and argue with you here,” Superman starts wearily, “but at some point, we’re going to talk about your recent behavior.”

Batman just stares at him and says nothing. Superman sighs, definitely in disappointment. Then, he turns away from the Bat and puts a hand on Nightwing’s shoulder. After a moment of hesitation, he runs his other hand once through Wing’s messy hair. His brother seems to appreciate it, but Red Robin doesn’t miss the displeasure that comes over Batman’s face at the action. 

Clark says something too quiet for Tim to pick up, but whatever it was Dick just smiles sadly and says what looks like ‘sorry’ in response. Clark shakes his head and says “it’s not your fault” just loud enough to hear. Just loud enough for Batman to hear, Tim would guess. Then Superman rolls his shoulders and walks away, gone like he was never there to begin with. 

“Alrighty, then,” Jason says, but whatever obnoxious comment he was about to make is cut off by Cass.

“Time to go,” she says. Batman turns sharply to enter, and the rest of them file in after. The bat disappears to the pilot’s cabin while the rest of them head to the passenger deck. The lights flicker in warning overhead, so they strap themselves in for takeoff.

The main room they settle in is where they’ve unbolted things and moved them around, so it looks more like a lounge than anything else. Seats are in a loose circle, and two more are turned over together in the middle to form a table. Everything has since been rebolted, so there’s no worry of anything getting thrown around once they start moving. 

“Where are the bags?” Dick asks.

“In the other room,” Tim answers, pointing to the door on the far wall. There’s a barrack-esque room with beds that they’ve strapped down their bags to. 

The ship jerks a bit, and then they’re flying. Watchtower is already in space, so there’s no atmosphere to uncomfortably break through, but it’s still best to keep their seat belts on while the ship gets up to speed. 

He and Cass talk about which card games they should play first when it’s clear to get up. By discuss, Tim really means that Cass is trying to get Tim to agree to play spoons and Tim is fervently trying to convince her to play anything else. He’d really like to avoid someone getting a serious injury on the first day of travel. 

The lights flicker again. Tim has just managed to convince Cass into a game of rummy instead when Dick taps him on the shoulder. 

“Timbo,” he almost whispers. “Could we talk?” Dick shoots a look to the other room then looks at Tim in question. Tim is confused for an instant, then gets nervous. Is this it? Is this where Dick tells him that when they get home, he wants Tim to back off so he- no. No, Dick wants to talk, because they’ve needed to for a long time and haven’t because Tim’s been putting it off. He had wanted to stay angry at Dick for abandoning him for Damian. He didn’t want to stay mad at Dick anymore though, it hurt, and it’s time to clear the air. He nods at Dick, and he feels bad about how relieved Dick looks about it.

“Sorry, Cass. Looks like you’ll have to play without me. I’m sure you can still talk those losers into playing with you.”

Cass shrugs and goes to interrupt whatever Steph and Jay are talking about, but she shoots him a tiny smile before she walks away. 

He follows Dick into the bedroom. Dorm? Barracks? Sleeping room? Whatever, the room of beds, and watches Dick sit on the edge of the bed with his stuff strapped under it. Tim debates sitting on the bed next to his, but then decides to perch on the foot of Dick’s bed. There’s still space between them, but it would be easy to get closer. 

For a few seconds they just stare at each other, and Tim has the fleeting urge to play dumb. He wants to pretend that he doesn’t know what’s happening, pretend the silence isn’t awkward or heavy, and that everything is already okay. 

“Timmy, tell me how I hurt you.” Does he seriously not know? Does he need it spelled out for him? Something must show on Tim’s face because Dick elaborates. “I know how I _think_ I messed up. I already have a list of things I did wrong and how it fell apart, but I don’t know how _you_ feel. I need to know the parts that hurt you the most and what you thought- what you _felt_ was happening, so that I know where to start.” That…makes sense. Tim doesn’t like it, but he dislikes the thought of letting anything slide more. He takes a deep breath trying to decide where to start.

“I…guess the worst was that you didn’t believe me about Bruce still being out there.” Not really, but he can’t start with robin, so this is the next worst thing. Dick looks like he knows, but Tim knows he won’t mention it. “I was sure of it, and I couldn’t understand why you didn’t believe me. Not even that, you didn’t even give me a chance,” Tim is getting faster, a little louder. “I mean, you would barely give me the time of day and anytime I even started to mention it you shut me down, but you were wrong. I was _right_ and I needed someone in my corner…and I don’t understand why you weren’t.” 

Dick is hugging one leg and looking at Tim while he rests his head on his knee. He’s waiting to see if Tim will keep going but he’s done. Then, Dick’s expression tightens around the eyes and stares at Tim’s shoulder. 

“Believe it or not, it’s not that I didn’t trust your judgement. You were grieving, but that didn’t nullify the fact that you’re the best detective out of all of us.” Dick meets Tim’s eyes and half-smiles. It’s a little proud, and a younger part of Tim preens, but the expression is mostly distant. 

“You wouldn’t hear a word of it. Why then, if you didn’t think it was desperate garbage?” 

“Whether you were right or not, it was something you needed to believe, right? You held onto it because it helped you get through the day?”

“…yeah, you could say that.”

“Back then in the thick of it, right after the funeral, I needed to _not believe it_ , or I wasn’t going to make it through the day.”

“How does that make any sense?” Tim cries. “Didn’t you want him back?” 

“Of course, I did,” Dick says quietly. “Of course, I wanted more than anything for Bruce to be alive. I spent half my life waiting for the day he wouldn’t come back, and I still felt blindsided when it happened.” Dick pauses. If Tim were paying attention, he would’ve seen the small shudder, but he’s too busy absorbing what Dick just said. Tim loves Bruce, loves him like a father even, but Bruce didn’t raise him.

What would it be like, to know that the closest person you had to a parent was a vigilante who went head to head with Gotham’s worst every night, on purpose? He’d asked Dick what Bruce had been like, before Jason’s death, and he’d asked about what Bruce liked and responded well to. Tim has asked about Dick’s time as Robin. He’d never asked about what Bruce was like as a guardian, about what it was like to be a child in Batman’s home. Dick isn’t done though, and this is about Tim and Dick, so maybe he can ask later. 

“I didn’t want Bruce to be dead,” Dick says with finality. “He was gone, though. He was gone, and things were falling apart, and I was being pulled in hundred different directions because when you are heir apparent that means you actually have to do things when the man in charge dies.” Tim almost feels offended, but Dick’s not accusing him of inaction. He is getting worked up though.

“Dick,” Tim says softly.

“I spent years building my own life away from Gotham, and none of it mattered. I had to quit the job I liked, because you were sixteen and Lucius wasn’t going to dump W.E. on you, so that means it fell on me. I had to give up the mask that I _loved_ because I found out the only thing that I hate more than wearing the cape and cowl is thinking about you or Jason wearing it.” Dick huffed, “Jason didn’t even want it, just wanted to cause a scene, and you weren’t ready, not that I would’ve given it to you if you were. You deserve better than the cowl.” Dick’s not looking at Tim anymore, but even so Tim can see that his eyes are bright. He doesn’t really know how to react to Dick telling him that he deserved better than to be batman; doesn’t think he quite understands what Dick’s implying, but he does need Dick to breathe.

“Dick.” 

Dick faces him and says, “I had a business I didn’t want but had to keep afloat, I had a legacy to live up to even though I hated it, and I had a child to take care of who wasn’t mine and who I didn’t ask for.”

Tim closes his eyes. The circumstances sounded pretty hopeless when Dick laid them out like that, but that’s just it. If Dick wanted so badly to go back to normal, why had he pushed Tim away?

“Why did you need Bruce to be dead to get through the day, then? Shouldn’t you have held out hope most of all?” He practically demands.

“Don’t you get it, Tim? If I let myself hope that Bruce would come back so I could get my life back it would have broken me.”

“What…what do you mean?”

“It was irrelevant where Bruce was because he wasn’t where he was supposed to be. His ten-year-old son needed to be shown there were other ways to live than Ra’s way. Gotham needed a batman, and I don’t love Gotham, but Bruce did, and I love him. Men die but symbols don’t, Timmy. I uprooted my whole life to live one I didn’t want because I had to. It sucked, but it was bearable because it had to be done. If I let myself think Bruce was out there? That one day he would save me, and I didn’t have to do that anymore? You may be brilliant Tic-tac, but you’re not infallible. I had to find my balance on the assumption that Bruce would never come back, because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to find my balance at all. I was tired, angry, and stressed out all the time, but I kept going because I had to. You raving about how unnecessary it all was because B was out there somewhere, with no evidence and wild eyes, really didn’t help.” Dick stops for a moment. He collects himself, his eyes very soft when they meet Tim’s. Tim thinks he might stop breathing because he almost gasps when Dick takes his hand.

How long has it been since he’s held Tim’s hand? 

“If I could do it over again, I would try to support you. I couldn’t have believed you, not really, but I didn’t have to be mean about it. I should have treated you better.”

Tim holds tight to Dick’s hand and asks quietly, “I was right, Dick. Why didn’t you believe me?”

Dick squeezes his hand once. “Neither of us knew 100% that Bruce was alive, or that we would be able to get him back if he was. If I let myself believe you and he never turned up, I would have died.”

“Dick?”

“I felt trapped, and I don’t do well with being somewhere I don’t want to be. If I rebuilt with permanence in mind, then I could eventually be comfortable. When I saw myself in the batsuit it was unpleasant, but it was for Bruce, and I could do it. If I had put on the suit with the idea that it was temporary, every single night that it kept happening would’ve chipped away at me. A whole year hoping that ‘this day would be the last day’ and it would finally be over? I would’ve jumped off of Wayne Tower before the six-month mark.”

Tim shook his head, then kept shaking it until Dick squeezed his hand. Tim stills.

“Timmy,” Dick says gently. Tim doesn’t answer, doesn’t even look at him, just looks down at the mattress. Dick tugs his hand and Tim lets himself be pulled toward his big brother. Dick doesn’t hug him, but they sit shoulder to shoulder now, and Tim almost leans into him. 

“Tim, it was a bad time for everyone. We both could have done better at talking about our feelings, but my problems are not your responsibility. If I handle something poorly you don’t need to give me a pass because I was hurting. I _will_ encourage you to tell me when I’m being a dipshit and hurting your feelings so that I can knock it off, but my behavior isn’t your responsibility.” Dick rubs soothing circles on Tim’s wrist while Tim comes back to himself.

It’s not dissociation, Tim’s had enough episodes of that to know the difference, but it’s close. He’s definitely present, but he wishes he weren’t. Tim thought that he’d gone cold when Dick had supposedly been killed, but doing it himself? What would Tim have done if Dick had been as committed as Tim had been, but it hurt him instead of helping like it had Tim? One more straw to break the camel’s back, except as one more push to send Dick off the ledge. 

“I don’t suppose we can stop talking for the day, right?” Tim asks.

“Nah. If we drop it now, we won’t ever pick it up again baby bird.”

“The only other thing is robin. I don’t think I can handle talking about robin right now.”

“You can, Timmy. If you need to yell, or rant, or cry, you can. Whatever you need to do, be nice or be clinical or be small, you need to let it out somehow. I’m not going to leave you.”

Tim can feel the tears trying to form in his eyes, but he refrains. He takes a deep breath, shaky but enough to steady him. Dick isn’t wrong, Tim needs to know what the hell Dick thought he was doing, and it’s probably now or never. 

“No one may have picked me to be Robin, but I earned it. I was Robin for years, I earned it, it was mine. Then suddenly everything is wrong. My friends are dead. Bruce is dead. Damian wants me dead. Everything is wrong and the only thing I have left that makes sense is Robin, and then I’m dismissed for no reason. I’ve referred to you as my older brother to other people, and you made me feel unwanted.” He doesn’t look at Dick, doesn’t want to see the look on his face, the judgement in his eyes. His breathing hitches when he realizes the circles on his wrist have stopped.

“First, I’m so sorry.” Dick starts the circles again and Tim feels a little less like crying. “Nothing I ever say can make up for how I made you feel, but I’m so sorry Tim.” Dick sighs, then brushes Tim’s bangs out of his face with his free hand. Tim shudders at the contact, but he’s still not going to look at him. 

“Second, you’re right. Robin was yours and taking it from you was a terrible thing to do. Instead of having a real discussion I essentially fired you, and I of all people should have known better.”

“Hm?”

“Did we never get around to that?” Dick asks with a hand squeeze. “I was fired. I was fired a lot, actually, but that last time was pretty bad. It took me months to get back on my feet, and that was with Clark and the Titans to help me.” Tim will file that tidbit away for later. He gets back on topic.

“So, if the goal wasn’t to kick me out, what was the goal?” 

“You were Bruce’s best Robin,” Dick says, and Tim starts. “We’re not talking about anything else, not about sons or successors or anything else. If there were three robins, and they were meant to be partners to Batman, you were the best Robin by far. That’s all well and good, but Bruce wasn’t Batman anymore, and that created a problem. As much as I push equal partnership, the dynamic has never been equal, and I couldn’t see you as anything but. If you were my robin, I would have to have something left to teach you, but I didn’t. You were tested, you said yourself that you’d been robin for years; you were ready to fly on your own.”

“I didn’t feel ready.”

“And that’s where I went wrong. You _were_ ready to move on from Robin, but it shouldn’t have happened like that. I desperately needed to give Dami something to hold onto, so that he would stay put. I was essentially just trying buy time until I could convince the small child with Wayne written all over him that murder was bad. I saw that Damian needed something to hold onto, and that you were ready, and thought it would be fine.”

Dick takes Tim’s jaw in his hand and makes Tim look at him. “I was _wrong_ Tim. It didn’t even occur to me that I was taking away something that you were holding onto. I need you to know that I…I can’t regret giving it to Damian, but I _can_ regret taking it from you instead of asking. Instead of waiting until you felt ready. Instead of explaining it to you the right way the first time. I can regret that I hurt you, and I do.” Tim feels his eyes water again and he tries to face away, but Dick brings his other hand to Tim’s face, so he has to keep looking.

“Diiiiiick,” he whines, he can't help it. Dick grins but doesn’t let go.

“I made you feel like I don’t see you, as if I don’t _want you_ , which is the furthest thing from the truth. I am always going to consider you family; I’m always going to love you, and worry about you, and want you around. I understand why you left, I did the same thing when I was your age, but I was devastated when you weren’t around. I missed you, and I’m glad I get to see you now, and I’ll do better. I promise.”

“Will you just hug me so we can be done now?” Tim asks, ignoring the frog in his throat, and trying to ignore the knot in his heart that’s coming undone.

“Do you want a hug or just out of the conversation?”

“I…” Tim has no reason to hesitate. He does want the hug, but he feels like he’s forgetting something. _I was devastated_. Oh. “Dick,” he says urgently, and his brother refocuses. “I’m sorry I never checked in. I’m sorry you were all alone and that I made things harder instead of easier.”

Dick moves his hands from Tim’s face to Tim’s hands and holds both of them. “It’s alright. Maybe we can call it even?”

“I forgive you,” Tim says, and finally he feels like it’s the right thing because Dick’s eyes start watering too. “Forgive me?” He asks cheekily.

“Of course,” Dick says with a grin. He _finally _pulls Tim closer with a soft, “C’mere, Angel.”__

__Tim hugs his brother. He cries, and it’s fine because Dick’s crying a little too. It’s fine, because he finally feels something in him mend after being broken for so long. It doesn’t change what happened, but he does feel better, and he doesn’t want to hold this against Dick forever. Tim just wants to be able to hang out with Dick again and it’s finally okay. Tim feels real, and present, and warm. Dick still loves him and wants him, and they talked about Robin without hurting each other._ _

__Today is a good day._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey shoutout to Spectacular_Geek_27 who wrote me a really nice response to a comment on one of their stories. It has nothing to do with this, but it really made my day to see it and I wanted to gush about it.


	17. Jason- Zemblanity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be careful with this one kids, it gets dicey. The batkids are doing better, that does not mean they are doing well, and Jason and Dick are both in pretty rocky places emotionally. This conversation does not go as well as last chapter's, so just make you're taking care of yourself.
> 
> On a lighter note, all of your comments on the last chapter were super nice and helped me push through and actually finish this chapter, it was really stop and start this go around, so thanks for everyone's kind words!

Jason is bored. Astoundingly bored, though it isn’t a surprise. A weeklong journey through space to a distant planet might sound exciting, but the fun stuff only happens when the spaceship lands; before that it’s about as heart-pounding as an overly long bus ride. 

The first day isn’t horrible. The girls and he play cards while big bird and baby bird sort out their shit, and when they stumble out later with misty eyes no one mentions it; they just deal them hands for the current game. What follows are several intense rounds of Go Fish. Jason hadn’t known that Go Fish could result in so many bruises.

After the fifth time someone cries out in pain Dick puts a pause on cards for the day. He tries to accomplish this with food, and when that doesn’t work, he pulls out the pleading puppy eyes, which works for if no other reason than it’s been too long since any of them have seen them. Collective loss of immunity. 

As he passes out MREs Dick’s eyes keep glancing to the door to the captain’s cabinet, and Jason briefly hates Bruce. Here they are, right in front of him, and all Goldie can seem to think about is the goddamn batman. Once everyone is settled, Dick takes a bag and slips away to see Bruce. Jason hates them both.

He keeps his mouth shut during dinner, lest he say something he doesn’t mean to the brats. Tim is quiet too, leaning on Steph more than anything, and he barely even blinks at Cass stealing half of his meal. At one point, Steph glares at her when she reaches for one bite too many, and it just solidifies that Timster should go to bed soon. Pathetic kid can’t even defend his own food.

This is another thing Jason should hate. He did not sign on to be anyone’s keeper, especially not such a self-destructive bird, but he can’t help but look for things like Tim’s obvious fatigue. Can’t help actively trying to fix the things he finds. Jason should hate it, but he doesn’t, and he hates that he doesn’t. He hasn’t called Tim ‘replacement’ in a while, and he doesn’t want to think about why, doesn’t want to admit that the flash of hurt in Tim’s eyes when he used it made Jason feel bad. 

If the kid needs badgered it should be Goldie taking the reins. Dick is here, after all. Yet here Jason is, shoving the kid’s shoulder and telling him to get some sleep. It’s Jason the kid complains to and grumbles at and begrudgingly listens to. Jason doesn’t hate the feeling he gets when Tim listens to him. The feeling that settles in his chest as Tim decides to _trust him_ , even though it should be a bad idea. 

Once he makes sure the baby bird is off to sleep, he turns back around to see Dick is there watching, and Jason absolutely hates the look on Dickie’s face. The bastard is standing there with an insufferable expression that Jason wishes he could be justified in hating so much. It would be fine if Dick were to look even a little bit smug or condescending. Instead, Dick has the gall to look at Jason with something like pride. 

Cass rises and pulls Blondie with her, and as they pass, one of them shoves Jason in Dick’s direction. He takes back any nice thought he’s ever had about either of them. 

Dick’s expression doesn’t change; eyes that are quietly proud like they used to be when Jason managed to do a whole floor routine without forgetting a step, and a pleased little smile that always felt more real than the blinding grins he always had at the ready. Jason hates that he likes the attention.

“The fuck are you looking at?”

“You,” he coos.

Jason makes an angry sound, but Dick doesn’t even blink. He just keeps looking at Jason. He’s staring, really, and it’s rude in how soft it is. The rest of Dick is a little tense, tight in a way that Jason recognizes, but those absurdly blue eyes always give him away. Dick is prepping for a fight, but not with Jason, so he can only assume he’s about to go back to Bruce. He hates that this is their first real chance for a moment alone since Dick came back, and Dick is going to blow him off to disappear for the rest of the night.

All while looking at him like he’s some kind of tiny kitten; like something to be cradled. 

“Good night, Jay.” There’s kindness in his smile, but it’s something Jason ignores. He doesn’t have to forgive him for choosing Batman in this moment over him. He doesn’t have to, he’s not going to, and he glares at the door to the pilot’s cabin as it closes. Jason goes to bed upset that night.

The next day is better. Dickhead ended up waking them all up to ‘keep some semblance of a sleep schedule’ even though they all know that it’ll end up a futile effort. Bruce shows up to breakfast in his suit, which is awkward since everyone else is in loungewear, but at least the cowl is down. It’s clear he’s still disappointed with all of them, but Jason couldn’t care less at this point. He’s pretty sure he’s not the only one. Maybe that’s why Bruce fucks off and hides for the rest of the day.

Jason finds he’s not done being resentful about Goldie spending the night with the old man. This leads him to generally avoiding Dick, and consequently avoiding Tim since the two of them end up spending hours catching up. Jason intrudes on the girls and they let him, so he figures it’s fine, at least for today. A lot of it is gossip about Steph’s college friends who he doesn’t know, or Cass’s friends in Hong Kong who he also doesn’t know. He loses the conversation thread a lot, but he honestly doesn’t mind; he should know who his sisters hang out with. Only so he knows who to talk to if they go missing or something. Completely for business reasons and nothing else. Definitely. 

There is light conversation and light snacking for the rest of the day. As much ‘day’ as there can be in space, anyway. Before dinner Dick asks to talk to him, Jason’s avoidance has not been subtle and has not gone unnoticed, but he brushes him off and continues ignoring him. Dinner is a little tense because of it, but it’s not like he cares. 

Tim sticks close to Dick for the next couple of hours, but Jason does see him almost trip and fall on his face. He catches Dick trying to coax Tim into bed shortly after.

“Cass,” Dick calls. She looks up from the game they’ve been playing on Steph’s tablet. 

“Help me bully Toblerone into a bed.” The devious smirk Cass acquires unsettles Jason, but the look of fear that crosses Timmy’s face at the request makes him feel better. 

Tim is hopelessly outmatched against both of them working together, and he only hears sounds of struggle in the other room for a brief moment. Beside him, Steph is giggling like mad. Jason can’t help but crack a grin at the delight on her face.

A few minutes later Dick emerges from the other room. Cass noticeably does not. 

“Where my girl be, D?” Steph asks.

“Laying on Tim,” Dick says. “Apparently, he is very comfortable, and she’s taking enforced bedtime as an opportunity to use him as a pillow.”

“It’s what he deserves,” Steph says sagely. Dick looks at Jason and lifts an eyebrow in question.

“Cuddled into submission is what he deserves?”

“Truly a just punishment for his abysmal self-preservation. Regular sleep and human contact are horrors like none other to the likes of him,” Jason dramatically intones. Steph leans back and hoots in mirth. Dick just smiles widely at him, though there’s clearly laughter in his eyes. 

Once Steph settles down, the eldest bird asks her how her classes are going. She spins a long tale of academia that Dick follows along to attentively, and Jason smirks to himself about recognizing every name she drops, even one that Dick has to ask about. Halfway through an excruciating rant about ‘the worst science professor to walk the earth’ Blondie yawns.

“Steph,” Dick interrupts.

“What?”

I think it’s time we wrap up for the night,” he says gently. Stephanie must respond better to gentleness than Jason does; he woulda socked Goldie for that kind of tone, but Steph smiles sheepishly and gets out of her chair. Then, she winks at Jason, and tackles Dick to the ground. 

It clearly only works because Dick lets it happen; he angled their fall so Steph didn’t take any of the impact, and he’s failing at suppressing his stupid grin. Jason watches Steph and Dick tussle on the ground for a minute until Dick sits on her.

“Yield,” he demands playfully.

“Ugh. Yield.” Dick rolls off of her and smoothly stands while Steph wriggles on the ground like a worm. Dick holds out his hand to her with a smirk so indulgent it has to be fake. Steph accepts the help, dusts herself off, then flounces off to the bedroom. 

“Farewell, my compatriots. I have been bested today, but tomorrow is a new battlefield.”

Jason glares at her. “Go away,” he says.

She sticks her tongue out at him and disappears behind the door. Jason turns to Dick and sees that he’s gone soft again. There’s no tension like there was last night, so he looks even easier than before. 

Jason can’t even find it in himself to be mad about it this time, not when Dick perches in a chair and gives Jason his full attention. Not when it’s clear that there will be no walking out this time. Jason takes a seat in the chair next to his.

“Why did you spend the night with Bruce?” He asks, deceptively casual. _Why didn’t you spend it with us_ , he doesn’t ask. Dick’s eyes flicker with surprise, but he doesn’t react outwardly to the question anymore than that. 

“I…” he eyes the door to the bedroom. Then, he meets Jason’s gaze. “I wanted to make sure I wasn’t going to wake up screaming.”

“Is that a major concern?” It comes out harsher than he meant it to, mostly because he’s trying not to choke.

“Not a major concern, no. I have a tendency toward delayed trauma though, and heaven knows when the last time I processed anything was. Just being cautious.” 

Despite how relaxed he was a minute ago, Dick is rife with tension now. It’s a subtle thing, but all of them were taught to notice the little things. Jason doesn’t blame him for his unease, saying that was tantamount to admitting weakness, and there are a lot of reasons why he shouldn’t do that when he’s talking to Jason. Yet here he is, doing it anyway, and Jason has to wonder…not now.

“Okay,” Jason dismisses. Dick beats him to the next question.

“Is that why you were mad at me today?” Dick asks. He sounds confused. Jason glares at him.

“Was I mad because you blew us off for the old man? Yeah, though it was obviously just an unfortunate side effect of your dumb ass making sure you didn’t scare the kids.”

“Jay? What the fuck?” He sounds honestly baffled. Jason can’t think of what in his statement wasn’t obvious, so he’s just confused about Dick’s confusion. He ends up just staring at Dick for a few heartbeats. 

“Jason. How is spending a few hours talking to B considered blowing you off? We’re here for days, and I hadn’t gotten to talk to him yet.”

“Did you really even talk to him, or were you just reporting like a good boy? So you can get back to your mission as soon as we’re done here?”

“What is happening right now?” Dick’s eyes narrow. “I didn’t realize you were so easily offended by me talking to someone you don’t like. Should I just never talk to B again, Jay? Would that make you happy?” He rolls his eyes, and Jason cannot stand the little things in Dick’s response.

Little things, like how Dick never actually said anything to defend himself, or how he didn’t say Jason was being unreasonable. He barely looks mad, just confused. Instead of offended, he just looks tired; the corners of his mouth are tilted down. Frazzled isn’t really the emotion Jason was trying to provoke. Jason rolls with it anyway. 

“Yeah, it would, but that isn’t really an option.” Dick’s eyes go wide, but Jason continues. “Are you bailing as soon as we get back to Gotham?”

Dick blinks at him. “Ideally, I would have at least a couple of hours before I had to leave. Is there something- why?”

“Oh, y’know,” Jason says, waving his hand. “Just seems like bad parenting to go to the trouble of bringing your kid back only to abandon them.” It’s incredibly mean, and a lot unfair, but Jason knows it’ll get Dick to snap back at him. He doesn’t know why he needs Dick to get angry, but it suddenly seems very important that it happens. Jason sees the tension start coiling in Dick, but the fire never reaches his eyes. Dick sinks into the chair he’s in and looks away from Jason. 

“I am not his father,” Dick says quietly. “I’m not his parent, and I’m not- he won’t…he won’t be alone.” His head swivels to look Jason in the eye as he says, “He _won’t_ be.” It sounds like he’s trying to convince himself more than Jason, and Jason just feels frustrated. This wasn’t supposed to be that kind of button; Dick’s response to being called Demon’s dad was exasperation at worst. When Damian was his Robin-

Jason is an idiot. Of course that’s a sore spot now. The demon was Bruce’s partner now, another thing Dick loved taken away from him because Bruce wanted it. It probably didn’t help that the kid died to save Dick. Dames can’t be Dick’s pseudo-son on top of that, that’s just insult to injury.

Jason might be an idiot, but he made this bed, might as well lie in it. “The only person he’s going to want is you.” 

Dick puts his head in his hand, his back a graceful curve of sorrow. “I’ll get to see him. I’ll get to tell him that I love him, and how much I missed him. I’ll get to tell him where I’m going, and why, and he’ll understand. He’s good like that.” 

Something twists in Jason. Whether it’s the obvious grief and longing in Dick’s voice, or the thought that their reunion maybe could’ve been as nice as this one is shaping up to be if Jason’s comeback had been planned instead of a clusterfuck, Jason’s not sure. He decides to address neither of those twisty things.

“He’ll understand, huh? Why don’t you explain it to me so I can understand? That email was pretty sparse on any real information, and I don’t appreciate being tapped as messenger boy for the real messenger boy.” Jason doesn’t expect this to be the thing that draws Dick into ire, but he’s still disappointed that Dick draws up a knee to rest his forehead on instead of scowling at Jason for being ungrateful for sending a message at all. It’s weird, to see him so subdued, that’s all. 

“Are you mad that I texted you or mad that I left the real message for Tim? Is this another jealousy thing, like how you didn’t talk to me all day because I didn’t talk to you last night?” There’s a hint of an edge, it’s almost an accusation, but it comes out too tired for Jason to be properly insulted. Maybe it’s a redirect from the Damian thing, or a redirect from the mission. Hell, at this point Jason could be convinced it is honest curiosity with the weird mood Dick is in. 

“How ‘bout you tell me why first. Maybe I could find it in me to forget about it,” Jason says evasively. 

“You don’t forget about anything as long as it annoyed you.”

“What’s annoying me right now is that you’re stalling.”

“So are you. Answer my question first, then I’ll answer yours.”

“This isn’t a negotiation, Dickie. It’s- “

“It’s not an interrogation, either. It’s a conversation. Tell me what bothered you, then I’ll tell you why I did it.”

When he says it so plainly it sounds reasonable, but all Jason hears is an echo of last week. _'I don’t answer to you'_ rings in Jason’s ears, and it’s easier to be angry at Dick than it has been all day. 

Dick’s guard is down. It has been down for this entire conversation, which means that he isn’t paying attention to his surroundings, and it’s why Jason has no problem standing and grabbing him by the hair. Dick’s eyes go wide, and Jason takes some satisfaction in reminding the prick that he can’t be pushed around so easily.

Jason pulls, and Dick winces. In the back of his mind Jason _knows_ that he shouldn’t be doing this. Louder, though, is a feeling of wrongness about having gotten this far in the first place. The brother Jason remembers would have never let Jason get away with any of this. It’s hard to admit how…uncomfortable seeing Dick like this is. He doesn’t want to think about it. He just needs Goldie to react how he expects _one_ time. 

Jason draws the hand in Dick’s hair away, then slaps him with it instead. “You think you can just order me around and tell me what to do? Think just because you’re nicer about it than _him_ you don’t have to tell me what I want to know? I asked you a question, _Dick_. It was so important that Batman beat you into it. So, what’s daddy have you doing out there?” 

Jason is looking down at wide blue eyes as they blink rapidly. Dick swallows, then focuses on something over Jason’s shoulder. “Beat me into it…?” Oops. 

“Don’t play dumb,” he hissed. “I saw the footage. The footage where he kicked the shit out of you until you finally hit back, then kept at it until you did what he wanted.”

Dick finally meets his eyes, and they are so close to indignant, _so close_ to something other than the exhaustion that sits too close to the Dick in said footage for Jason’s liking. Then Dick blinks, and they’re right back to no hint of fire at all. Dick is soft and sad, and it pisses Jason off.

“Look Jay, you saw what happened, and it was a disaster. I’m not going to argue that it wasn’t more a nasty fight than a fair spar, it was, but it’s not entirely what it looks like.”

Jason turns and paces around for a few minutes with heavy footsteps. It doesn’t help settle him, so he ends up kicking the table. The thud is painful but satisfying, and also loud, Jason is surprised that no one has come to check on them yet. 

“What the hell do you mean, ‘not what it looks like’ what is wrong with you?” He rounds on Dick, who is still curled up in the same fucking chair just _staring_ at him. “Who even- wha- I don’t know who you are!”

“Do you want a real answer, or an answer that will make you feel better?” Dick asks the question like Jason has a real option, like he’s not going to say whatever he thinks Jason should hear either way, honest or not. He asks softly like he hasn’t lied to Jason’s face before with no tells at all a dozen times.

‘ _I want a real answer,_ ’ he had demanded of Bruce. Here Dick is, offering one. It could turn out to be total garbage, but it’s possible that maybe Jason is miscalculating. Only just maybe, but Dick did go against Bruce’s gag order. He was supposed to play dead and didn’t, for no other reason than he didn’t want to hurt them. 

Dick has said before that being Robin sticks with you, connects them together in a way, and Jason used to scoff at him. As he slowly made his way back into the family fold though, he’s started to feel what Dick is talking about. Jason will say it started when he and Steph formed a ‘Dead Robin’s Club’ and everything, but he can’t say he doesn’t strongly sympathize with Tim. Jason definitely can’t say that he feels no pull when talking to Dick. 

Dick didn’t lie to him when it counted; this whole fake death charade is proof of it. Jason at least owes him a chance.

“Look at me.” He waits until those stupid blue eyes meet his. “I want a real answer.”

Dick studies him for a second, then nods. “I’m sure it looked like I said I didn’t want to go, he hit me for a bit, and then I said yes. That’s not really…it’s not what he was trying to do, and it’s not why I said yes.”

Jason gives Dick the most disbelieving look he can, and Dick just half-smiles at him before continuing.

“I was always going to say yes. There was no doubt about it, not really.”

“You seemed pretty in doubt about it,” Jason countered. 

“No, I wasn’t,” Dick says coldly. “I’m not like you, I can’t just tell Bruce ‘no’ and fuck off whenever I feel like it. I’d like to sometimes, but that’s not an option I have anymore. Even a long time ago I- we- we’re always playing a give-and-take game,” he finishes quietly. He takes a moment to collect himself, then explains, “We’ve worked the same way since I was Robin; He takes care of me and I keep him out of the deep end. It’s why I was so sure I’d never go back to Gotham after your murder. He was determined to go too far, and I wasn’t going to risk my life to keep him sane. He gets my loyalty because the the goal is to protect people, but he was out there to self-destruct and take as many people with him as he could, and I wanted no part of it.”

“Lotta setup, Dick. What’s the payoff?”

“The payoff is that I was never going to say no and we both knew it. The second he said it was to protect you it was a done deal and it was already a done deal before that anyway,” Dick says sharply. Jason leans away and crosses his arms, taken aback. “The point is that I just had a pill shoved down my throat and listened to my own heart give out in real time. Bruce was there and didn’t leave and he could’ve asked me to do anything and I would have. Anything, and I would have done it, so he asked for the worst thing, and it was always a done deal anyway. That enough of a payoff, Jase?”

Well, Jason can’t say he didn’t get what he wanted. The answer was certainly a real one, and Dick’s simmering with fire. He’s lost the slouch and the hazy eyes, choosing to instead burn Jason with his glare in sharp clarity. 

“Yeah,” Jason says unsteadily. “There was never any doubt you would say yes.” Dick’s eyes are piercing, and Jason is again struck by what an idiot he is. This is exactly what he was aiming for, angry glare, low tolerance for Jason's shit, Dick’s little head tilt when he’s on the alert, the whole shebang. He’s getting frustrated all over again because all of the individual pieces of Dick’s temper are correct, but it still feels wrong. He feels like he’s looking at a puzzle with one piece left, but the only piece he has belongs to a different picture; something here isn’t clicking. He needs more information. “Tell me why Bruce hit you, if it wasn’t to persuade you.”

Dick grimaces. “You know how he’s still mad at you for dying?”

The twisting sensation comes back with a vengeance because yes, he does know that Bruce holds his death against him. Robin’s are supposed to live, and Jason failed, and there is a part of Bruce that will never forgive Jason for traumatizing him like that. Which leads him to a sinking feeling that he knows exactly where Dick is going with this.

“Don’t.”

“That’s all it was, Jay. You saw what happened, heard what he said. It doesn’t matter that it was only a few minutes, I died right in front of him. I hurt him, and even he can’t hold all that grief by himself.” Dick looks away. “He got scared, and he took it out on me because it’s easier if he blames me for it. He was in too much pain to handle so he beat it into me instead. I don’t mind.”

Jason thinks he might see red. Or green, it doesn’t matter. There is nothing but a burning, twisting feeling where his lungs should be, and Jason can’t stand it. He grabs Dick by the shoulders, searches for something in his expression; doesn’t find it even though even he doesn’t know what he’s looking for.

“That’s bullshit. He doesn’t- he doesn’t deserve that. Some kind of psychoanalysis that makes what he did okay. You should mind, Dick! He hurt you because he couldn’t handle his own fucking trauma, then what about yours? You had just-” He cuts off. He can’t say it out loud, all of a sudden.

“What, died? It wasn’t even ten minutes, that doesn’t count.”

“Then he doesn’t get to _punish you_ for dying! Either it counts, or it doesn’t, but it has to be one or the other, Dick. He’s a bastard either way.”

“It’s whichever gets me through the day, Jason.”

“Dick,” Jason says. His grip tightens on Dick’s shoulders. “It either doesn’t count, and he’s a bastard for hitting you while you weren’t fully recovered and yelling at you for a worst case that didn’t happen, for that matter you didn’t owe him anything and shouldn’t have left in the first place. Either that, or it did count. It does count, even if it didn’t last very long it was long enough to scare you, hurt you- _you_ , not him, and he’s fucking terrible for adding his garbage to your pile when you had enough going on. Don’t cover for him, he’s _wrong._ ”

“Jason, it’s not a healthy coping mechanism, but it’s not worse than anything else he does.” Dick says it quietly, like he knows it’s not what Jason wants to hear but it needs said anyway. Except that that’s nonsense. Just yesterday Dick was mouthing off about lines and standards, does abuse really not cross the line for him?

“Tossing his fucking son around like a ragdoll isn’t any worse than anything else he does? _Really?_ ” Dick rolls his eyes and Jason’s hands are fists balling Dick’s shirt now. 

“Why are you taking this so personally?” Dick asks tiredly.

Jason stops short. He draws away, takes a step back, stung. Then, furious, says, “are you kidding me? You take everything that’s ever happened to all of us personally, but I’m not allowed to get pissed at the old man for hitting his fucking kid just like-” Wait, no, that’s not where he meant to go with this. This wasn't supposed to be about his father. 

“Like Willis, is that it? Of course, you’re allowed to be mad at B for hurting me, but this isn’t the same thing, Jay.” Dick continues gently, “This isn’t child abuse.”

Jay tackles him. Knocks him right out of the bolted down chair and onto the hard floor. He pins him to the floor, looms over him. It’s even more frustrating because Jason can tell that it’s just like with Stephanie earlier; he’s only getting away with this because Dick isn’t trying, he hasn’t even really moved at all, and it’s all wrong. Dick is all movement, except it feels like there’s dead water where he expected a river, and the contrast is making Jason sick. He wants to punch him in his stupid, confusing, pretty face, but he refrains. 

“It doesn’t matter that you’re an adult, you’re still family. For all intents and purposes, he’s your dad and what he did is inexcusable. Stop trying to excuse it,” Jason growls.

Dick sinks into the floor. He’s not looking at Jason even though they’re practically face to face. Dick asks, “What do you want me to do, Jay?”

“Be mad about it, or anything but fine with it. Get mean,” Jason says. As ridiculous as it seems, Jason feels like he might beg if it gets Dick to see reason. If it gets him to give a shit about how Bruce treats him instead of letting him…get away with it. 

“You want me to get mean?” Dick says lowly. “You don’t accept that 'Bruce was taking out his fear and pain out on me because I disappointed him' as a good enough basis to forgive him. Yet here you are doing the exact same thing. Just. Like. Him.” 

What can he say? It’s not the same thing, but Jason hasn’t exactly handled this well, has he? Still hasn’t figured out how to be angry without destroying the things he touches. Without hurting the people close to him unless he runs away before he gets too mad. He can’t tell Dick he’s wrong while he’s literally pinned underneath him. Fuck. 

He rolls off of Dick in the ensuing silence. He’s staring at the wall when he feels Dick stands up beside him. 

“I’m going to bed,” Dick says roughly. Jason watches him walk into the bedroom, might even see the shadows of their younger siblings trying to look like they hadn’t been listening the whole time. Jason leans back until he’s lying on the floor, staring at the ceiling; too drained from how wrong everything went to get up, but too wired to consider going to bed. Not to mention there’s no way he’s going in there until he can be sure they’re all at least pretending to be asleep. 

Things are easier with Tim. He only argues when he’s really grumpy, and even then, he’s pretty easy to bribe into things. 

Things are easier with Cass. She never says anything stupid and rarely says anything at all, so she never pisses him off like the rest of them. If she needs something, she just asks for it, no pretenses.

Things are easier with Steph. She’s a street kid at heart like Jason, and never feels like she’s some sort of impossible enigma. She calls him on his shit honestly, but only at times he can run away if needed.

Things are never easy with Dick. Once he’s made a decision it’s impossible to change his mind, and he never shuts up, except that his silence is even worse, and Jason will never be able to cut him to the very core like he does Jason. 

He can’t ever seem to find the right words, so he looks at the ceiling and waits for his chest to stop hurting. Tries to think about anything other than what just happened, since all that will lead to is the truth that sits in Jason’s rib cage and makes itself known every time he fucks up so overwhelmingly.

There is nothing Jason hates more than himself.


	18. Cass- I'll Tell You No Lies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, what's up? I was too sad and angry about real life to be passionate about comic book characters but now I'm back. Also I may have gotten so into My Hero Academia that I didn't look at any other fandom for months. Anyway... here have a chapter.

Last night did not go well. Cass hasn’t seen Dick and Jason in the same place more than a couple of times ever, before or after Dick’s leave, and she’s starting to see why. Jason had been so relieved to see Dick the first day. His steps were sturdier, and he was always facing Dick in some way. Turned toward his big brother like a flower toward the sun. 

The day before today he had still been turned toward Dick, even when he was trying to ignore him. Jason was mad but he wanted Dick to know about it. He wanted Dick to see and kept checking to make sure Dick noticed him. Cass had stayed with Steph and Tim listening to them from the bedroom, and she stayed away even when they started getting extra loud. She couldn’t see them, only hear most of the words. Then Dick walked in and Jason didn’t. Cass looked at Dick before he could cover up how he felt.

Dick is very fast at covering up how he feels. He doesn’t do it often, not around family, but when he does it makes Cass uneasy. Even Bruce is not as good at being silent as Dick. In the sense that Batman is better at making no sound, but Nightwing is better at giving away nothing. So Cass looks at him as fast as she can because big brother doesn’t like to let them know how upset he gets.

What she sees before it’s gone says Dick is _very_ upset. His eyes are tired at the corners, his knees are locked like frustration, and the tilt of his head means he doesn’t feel safe. For the moment Cass gets to look, Dick is angry but doesn’t want to be, and sad but not letting himself be. Then he takes a deep breathe and it’s all gone. Usually, he performs something different than he’s feeling if he’s covering up, but tonight he doesn’t bother. Cass recoils a little on the inside at how nothing he is right now, and watches as he lays down in bed like none of them are there. 

“Dick?” Steph asks hesitantly. She still asked though. Steph is so brave. 

“Stephanie,” Dick chastises quietly. It’s soft and not mean, but Steph’s head ducks down at the use of her full name like that. 

Tim tries instead. “Dick we-”

“Tim. I get it, you heard some ugly stuff but I don’t need a check in right now. I need to go to sleep. Ask me in the morning.” Dick still isn’t mean, but his voice is firmer than before. It clearly says no more arguing. 

The three of them awkwardly lay down in their own beds and wait for something that doesn’t happen. Dick falls asleep quickly, Jason eventually comes back in without a word to fall asleep just as fast, and the rest of them wait for tomorrow. 

Cass wakes up to Dick calling her name gently. He won’t touch unless she’s the last one up because it still makes her nervous sometimes, but she gets up fast even though she doesn’t really want to. She has questions and she wants answers. As she dresses, she sees that Tim is still fast asleep. Dick seems content to leave him there, poking at Jason instead. 

“C’mon Jaybird, it’s morning.”

“There ain’t morning in space, fuck off.”

“Exactly!” Dick chirps. “That’s why it’s extra important to make our own morning. Get up.”

Then he makes his way out of the room with light, springy steps and long strides. This is something Cass will never understand about Dick except that he must have gotten it from Bruce- he will act like nothing unhappy happened yesterday at all. Like all the feelings he had going to sleep disappeared before he woke up. No one else does this, not even other heroes she’s met. It confuses her. Maybe she’ll ask about it when she asks her other questions today. 

She ambles her way to the spaceship’s living room. Amble is a fun word Steph taught her for lazy walking, and Cass has been trying to perfect her ambling ever since she heard about it. Sometimes she ambles through the store at the mall after she’s decided she doesn’t want anything, but Steph is still deciding. Sometimes she ambles through Tim’s apartment to show him that he is allowed to slow down. Right now, she ambles to the table where Dick is still setting out plates for breakfast. 

He flashes her a smile, there then gone but bright like a sunbeam. Then, he holds up two different pouches.

“Which do you want for breakfast today, Cass? 

She holds up two fingers and flutters her eyelashes. Dick smiles at her again, an exasperated little grin that reaches amused eyes. 

“No, Cass, you cannot have both.”

“I want both. I will starve with just one.”

“That’s why you eat one now and then another one later, and then,” he pauses to gasp dramatically. “You eat a _third_ one for dinner. Now pick one or I’ll pick for you the rest of the week.”

Cass decides to snatch the one in his left hand. She doesn’t know which one it is- didn’t bother to read the labels before her answer- but she knows that Dick will give her the worst ones all week if she’s stubborn. She hadn’t believed he’d follow through on that kind of threat once, and she won’t make the mistake again. 

When she finally looks at what’s in her hands, she’s happy at the hash brown breakfast she’s acquired. Cass looks up to see Dick already heading into the bedroom, probably to ask Jason what he wants, and maybe to start waking up Tim. Maybe not though. Dick always wants Tim to sleep more. 

She wonders where Steph could be. She wasn’t in the bedroom and she’s not in the main room either. Steph definitely isn’t in the pilot room with Bruce. Maybe she’s in-

Her thoughts are interrupted by a loud thud in the bedroom. She moves quickly, and giggles when she sees what’s happening. It’s Tim, wrapped up in blankets like a burrito, trying and mostly failing to get up from where he’s fallen on the floor. Jason is standing over him with a condescending smirk, watching Tim pitifully twist around trying to escape his binds. Dick has his head in his hands, a picture of defeat if he weren’t obviously holding back laughter. 

Dick looks up when he notices she’s come in. She tilts her head in question. He sighs.

His only answer is to shrug and say, “boys.”

“Boys,” she agrees, nodding her head. 

Jason whirls on her. “Hey! I’m right here.”

“Yes, being ridiculous, like boys usually are.”

The look of fake offense Jason makes has Cass fighting back another giggle.

Tim groans again after another failed attempt at untangling and Dick shakes himself into action. 

“Alright, enough, it’s time for breakfast. Tic-toc Timmy, wake up.” 

Dick makes a shooing gesture at Cass and Jason before turning toward the lump on the floor. Jason grumbles yet moves toward the door, but she watches as Dick lifts Tim onto the bed to start unwrapping him. Jason places a hand on her shoulder, and she lets him drag her away. 

Jason grabs one of the MREs that Dick abandoned on the table and opens it as he sits down. Cass keeps him company by sitting down herself and opens her hash browns. Only a couple minutes later Dick walks in with his arm around Tim’s shoulders, leading him to the table devoid of blankets. 

He doesn’t bother asking Tim what he wants, just sits him down next to Jason and picks one for him. He doesn’t move to sit with them though, which confuses her. It must confuse Jason too because he frowns at Dick.

“Not even gonna pretend you want to talk to us this morning?” Jason questions.

Dick turns to him, unamused, and answers, “Not catering solely to you doesn't mean I don’t want to talk to you.”

Jason opens his mouth, but Dick interrupts him.

“I’m getting Steph,” he explains. “She’s late.”

Then, he turns without giving Jason a chance to respond. The response clearly startles Jason, and Cass can see that he feels bad as Dick disappears down the stairs to the storage floors. Why would Steph be down there? Maybe she was looking through the supplies for something? Did she just need a change of scenery? 

Cass shrugs to herself and starts eating. Dick will roll his eyes at her, but he won’t mind as long as she doesn’t steal anything from Tim. She might do that anyway, but not until she’s done with her own food.

Jason looks at her, then looks at Tim who hasn’t opened his MRE yet, then at the door. He sighs and starts putting Tim’s meal together for him.

Dick comes back eventually, Steph keeping pace with him as they make friendly sounding chatter. It’s a little too fast and disjointed for her to follow- they’re making a lot of half-statements that make sense to the other but not to her, so she’s content to watch their bodies make happy gestures at each other and eat her food. 

Breakfast is a bit awkward. Jason keeps staring at Dick out of the corner of his eye like he expects Dick to say something about last night, which Cass can’t make any sense of because she knows that _he knows_ that Dick won’t. Tim perks up halfway through but minds his own business; he wants to say something, to ask questions, but she knows he won’t. He’s not nearly as good at pretending things are fine as Dick is, but sometimes he tries anyway when he doesn’t know how to address something. Dick and Steph talk to only each other the whole time, though Steph's gaze flits around more than usual, and she looks Cass's way every once in a while.

Cass wants to tell her not to worry- she’s only waiting until after breakfast to strike. 

Eventually everyone finishes their food. The mess gets squared away. Steph slams her hands on the table and says,

“I know you all have issues, but you couldn’t have gone two full days without making it weird for everyone? Sort out your shit.” 

No one moves. Cass decides that’s as good a signal as any, so she grabs Dick by the sleeve and pulls him into bedroom. He lets her, and Cass tries to take it as a good sign. It’s hard to tell with Dick sometimes. 

The door closes behind them, and Dick gently pulls away from her and sits on the closest bed. Cass sits on the bed across from his and he gestures for her to start. 

“I have questions,” she says bluntly. Nothing changes on his face except the very corners of his eyes, but they lift in something like fondness instead of nervousness. 

“I kind of figured that out, Cass. What are your questions?”

She hadn’t done a good job of deciding what to ask first during breakfast. She needs to ask something he can’t dodge without lying to her. 

“Why do you think the rules are different for you?”

Confusion seeps through his whole body, so she clarifies, “Why do you think the Bruce rules are different for you?”

“The ‘Bruce Rules’ are different for me.” His face is what Tim calls ‘unimpressed’ and what Steph calls the ‘do you think I’m stupid?’ face. 

“You know what I mean.”

“Do I?”

“Yes,” she insists. “He’s not allowed to hurt us that way,” she pauses, just for a tiny- should be unnoticeable but isn’t- beat as they both don’t wince at the implications of that, and continues, “He shouldn’t hurt you either.”

Dick doesn’t crumble, or bend, or sigh. He barely even blinks at her. She tries again.

“You weren’t mad. Bruce was. He was mad and afraid and you were only mad for a minute before you were sad instead.”

This, Dick balks at. He closes his eyes in a long blink and the hesitation is gone, but it was there and they both know Cass saw. 

“I was mad at him because I didn’t want to leave, and I definitely didn’t want to fight, but he had me in a corner. I don’t like it when he corners me to get what he wants instead of just talking to me. It’s annoying, so I was mad. I was sad because I didn’t want to leave without seeing you, and because the idea of hurting you by tricking you made me sad.”

He says it all slowly, and Cass doesn’t know if it’s so he has more time to think of what to say, or so that she can follow along more easily. It gives the impression that this is hard for him to say, but his posture isn’t weighed down and he doesn’t make the same face that Jason and Tim do when they have to talk about how they’re feeling. 

“Okay,” is the only reply she gives. “Why did you say that you didn’t care that he fought you? You were mad about it.”

Dick takes a deep breathe and long blinks again. Then he refocuses. He says, “When Jason wanted me to be mad about the fight, he didn’t want me to be mad about _having a fight_ with Bruce. He thought Bruce was taking advantage of me, and that’s what he wants me to be mad about, but Bruce didn’t take advantage of me, so I can’t be. Not the way Jason wants.”

Cass thinks about that. Does she think Bruce took advantage of Dick if Dick doesn’t? She watched the footage like everyone else, and they think so, but she also saw that Bruce moved like he was desperate to see Dick in action, and she saw that Dick didn’t want to fight, but also that he didn’t pull his punches. He won. What does that mean?

“What…what would it look like if he were? What’s the difference?”

“If he were taking advantage of me?”

She nods.

Dick smiles gently at her. He’s always happy to explain concepts to her. “So, okay. Hmmm.” He makes a face and taps his cheek. Then he repositions, straight across from her and sitting up straight. He signs as he speaks. 

“Bruce would be taking advantage of me if it was impossible for me to say no. Let me clarify that- if I couldn’t say no without something really bad happening. I felt cornered, so I felt like I had to say yes, but in reality, I _could_ still say no. If someone I loved was going to die or get hurt as a direct consequence of saying no, then that would be taking advantage of me. All that would have happened if I said no is that Bruce would be mad at me, which sucks but isn’t the end of the world. Any mission with a preference for which operative works it still has back-up options. If I really said no, then someone else could have infiltrated Spyral. It would have been okay.”

Cass…doesn’t know what to do. That makes sense to her, but it doesn’t feel good. Dick stops and looks at her, expression open and honest and gentle. He must see her conflict because he leans forward and carefully sets a hand on her shoulder. 

“I know that the fight Bruce and I had was ugly. We haven’t had an argument that bad in a long time, so I can’t imagine how upsetting it must have been to see. You saw though, right? That it was an argument. We disagreed about how to move forward, and we fought about it because we felt strongly enough that we needed to use our bodies and our voices.”

It had been a while since they had that first family meeting. Maybe they were wrong and got twisted up because it hurt to see how mean Bruce and Dick were being to each other. Bruce instigated the fight but… but she did see what Dick was talking about. Bruce said yes to Dick going undercover, and Dick said no to going undercover. Dick won the physical fight to reassure Bruce that he was okay, but then Bruce won the undercover argument to get Dick on a case he was worried about. 

It’s not like Dick didn’t go behind his back and tell them he was okay anyway. Maybe that’s what Dick meant about not being taken advantage of. 

“You told us you were okay even though Bruce told you not to. Would he have been taking advantage of you if you didn’t do that?”

Dick tilts his head, considering. “I think that if I felt like I couldn’t or I’d get hurt, then that might be a fair assessment. Maybe. If I didn’t tell you because I agreed with Bruce, or just because I didn’t want him to be mad at me, then no.”

Cass frowns. That wasn’t really helpful.

Dick sighs dramatically and holds Cass’s hands in his. He waits until she meets his eyes. 

“Cass, Jay and Tim, and Steph and Babs and everyone, they’re right that the fight was wrong. It wasn’t necessary, and Bruce was just being a stubborn jerk because he was scared. That’s it though. He was out of line, but he wasn’t taking advantage of me. It wasn’t _abuse_ , alright sweetheart?”

Cass studies his face. His eyes are pleading for understanding, but that could mean anything. His hands are around hers comfortably and not fidgeting, not even tracing circles around her wrist like he does when he’s restless but still wants to touch. The lines of his face give away nothing. He’s loose. He’s calm.

It’s not like he said what Bruce did was okay, just that Jason had misunderstood. He reads Bruce better than she can sometimes, so it’s true that he would know best if he was there and they weren’t. She squeezes his hands. He squeezes back; his little smile is adoring and just for her. 

“It’s about feelings, little sister,” he says. “I don’t feel especially bad about it. We’re going to be okay.”

Cass believes him.

She nods. She says, “Okay. Thank you for answering my questions.”

They separate. He assures her, “Anytime, Cass.”

She feels better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thinking about redoing the tags. Should I add 'It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better' ?  
> :)


End file.
